Sweet Development: Holiday Baking With Toddlers and Preschoolers
During the holiday season, as parents we want to make special rituals with our children. One of those rituals may include baking cookies or the infamous gingerbread house with our toddler or preschooler. Parents will all agree that this is a difficult challenge, but the benefits are so important for their development.
Baking Builds Math Skills
Kids learn all kinds of mathematical concepts while baking. When they are helping to dump 3 cups of flour into a bowl, they are counting.
Baking Enriches Oral Vocabulary and Reading Skills
Explanation and reasoning is an excellent way to build vocabulary while reading a recipe. Learning to follow the steps of a recipe is an important reading skill that will translate later into your child being able to understand how to read directions of any kind.
Baking Introduces Life Skills
It builds self-esteem by giving kids the skills they need to feed and look after themselves as they grow.
Baking Develops Fine-Motor Skills
For young children, baking provides fun fine-motor practice. When holding a spoon, kids are developing and strengthening their pincer grasp (needed for writing). Also, when they are stirring, they are building hand-eye coordination.
Baking Promotes Social Skills
"Who is going to do what?" and "Whose turn is it?" are both critical social lessons that apply to all sorts of situations. You are still modelling turn-taking and waiting skills.
Publications
News
Do you know what technoference is? Chances are you’ve experienced it, whether you are familiar with the term or not.
GLUCKSTADT, Miss. -- Children, parents and child care providers in the Gluckstadt area now have a new learning center with free resources. The Mississippi LIFT Resource and Referral Network at the Mississippi State University Extension Service provides mini-learning stations throughout the center with themed hands-on, play-based educational activities each month. Various free services are available through the center, including an educational lending library, referrals for teacher training, and family support services training.
STARKVILLE, Miss.
Success Stories
When 10-year-old Hasib of Starkville trots his horse during therapeutic riding, he experiences a lingering calmness that his mother attributes to the experience he shares with his horse.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/meet-the-ninth-grader-whos-helping-restore-mississippis-oyster-reefsMedia Chronicles Demi’s SuccessDemi Johnson is just 15 years old, but she is already impacting her community through 4-H and Girl Scouts.
When Kash Barnett started preschool, his vocabulary consisted of just five words.
