When rotating out your Montessori stations for your children, consider adding a Kitchen station.
Taking key items from your kitchen and finding a kid friendly alternative is important for an immersive experience. Providing your children with materials to create their own snack or meal can show them the value of learning. The independence created for a child within their own personal space is unmatched.
Giving a child access to take care of their own needs can be an eye opening experience. Have a conversation about kid safe options for snacks that they can prepare themselves. Storing the ingredients for these options somewhere accessible for children to grab at their pace provides them the autonomy to care for themselves.
The younger a child learns to take care of themselves the more time they have to master it. Before children have to self regulate their behaviors and body at school, giving them opportunities to feel self sufficient is important. Teaching children life skills is preparing them to be independent.
Switching out snacks that are kid friendly and accessible can be a lot of fun for children. Rotating out from one week, having blueberries to strawberries can bring excitement for children taking care of their own needs. Rotating out your child’s favorite snacks can also have them excited to eat.
Encouraging children to focus can help with their attention to detail in getting a job done. While it is okay to eat an apple uncut. Providing children with the tools to wash, cut and plate a snack can be rewarding. Adding these steps before consuming the snack allows the child to understand the value of taking their time to go through the steps of doing a task correctly.
Providing children with, SKÅGFÄ’s Kids Wooden Chef Knife makes independence a breeze. This multi-sensory wooden knife allows for safe and memorable learning experiences. Skågfä's beautiful, handmade wooden knife is a handy tool that encourages meal preparation participation and development of independence and fine motor skills. Designed for children aged three or older or under two with adult supervision.
Children are always watching to learn behavior. Showing your children how taking care of themselves can be fun and also a bonding experience. Displaying how to wash, and properly cut fruit before eating it shows children the process of the entire task they are to complete.
Little hands need little tools. Providing a station that allows them independent control of their cooking environment can lead to more independent behavior. Creating a kitchen that is working and not just for play within your child's stations is rewarding and exciting. Allow them to have access to snacks. Then, having an accessible sink to wash their hands and fruit in. Providing necessary and unnecessary items to mimic items in your kitchen can set the tone. Such as, a kid safe knife accompanied by a cutting board. While you may not be worried about keeping your child’s play kitchen free of marks and scratches; you are teaching your child the importance of items.
Finding snacks that motivate your child is key. Children that enjoy fruit and vegetables will be more eager to go through the steps modeled to reach an end goal of eating a self prepared snack. With children motivation can change. Some days it will be rewarding for a child to use their kid safe tools to cut some fruit snacks in half. Some days it is not important to restrict behavior to specific foods. However if children want to prepare other food that is safe for them to handle within the steps you have modeled it can still contribute to their overall learning experience.
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