August 23, 2021
August 23, 2021
Brain development during children’s early years is vital for further development later on in life, as well as overall health. The human brain will develop throughout a person’s life and well into adulthood; however, it is of the utmost importance for the first eight years of a child’s life. These years will be the time in which the foundation for learning, health, and success is built.
Many different things can affect brain development. Genetics will play a role, as well as nutrition and exposure to infections or toxins. But the most important part of cognitive development stems from the nurturing and responsiveness a child experiences while they are growing.
Both positive and negative experiences during the formative years will affect a child for their entire lifetime. Certain activities such as outdoor play, rest time, and traditional learning all play their part in the development of your child’s brain. But how can cooking help a child’s development? Let’s take a look at some of the ways learning to cook can help brain development in children.
What are the benefits of learning to cook?
One of the most obvious benefits of learning how to cook is being able to independently provide oneself with the sustenance needed to live. Cooking also has the ability to combat stress and boost physical health because of the nutrition that home-cooked meals provide. Because learning a new skill is a positive experience, it can also boost self-esteem and help a child gain confidence in themselves.
Adults who learned how to cook during their formative years tend to be more self-sufficient when it comes time to leave the nest, and they’re also more willing to open themselves up to a world of culture through different cuisines. Since eating is an incredibly social activity, it can also help to provide a positive energy exchange in your social circle and keep you connected with the people you love.
Now, those plus sides of learning to cook are all great, but how can cooking help your brain, exactly?
Why is cooking good for children’s development?
As mentioned above, a child’s early development is crucial to the rest of their lives and isn’t something that should be overlooked. There are many ways to boost children’s development, cooking being one of them. There are four main ways that cooking is good for your child’s development:
1. Social-emotional development
Social-emotional development plays a role in how a child experiences social situations, expresses themselves, and manages their emotions. It also has a hand in a child’s ability to form and maintain positive, rewarding relationships with other people as they continue to grow. To put it simply, social-emotional development is the catalyst behind all their relationships and emotions for the rest of their lives.
By learning how to cook, a child will develop a level of confidence and skill in the kitchen. By working together with you while you teach them, it helps them build a positive impression of teamwork and learn how to follow directions while working with others.
2. Physical development
Physical brain development refers to how certain parts of the brain that control physical movements grow and develop. Various parts of the brain control different things. The frontal lobe, for example, controls specific motor functions, while the cerebellum, an area behind the brain stem, helps to perfect those movements.
By teaching your child how to cook, you can help them fine tune various motor skills. For example, chopping up vegetables, rolling out dough, or mixing batters are all reliant on motor skills and hand-eye coordination. When you teach your child how to cook, you teach them specific movements that will help with the development of the areas of the brain that control fine motor skills, thus sharpening them for the rest of their lives.
3. Cognitive development
Cognitive development centers around certain abilities such as thinking, learning, memory, reasoning, attention span, problem solving, creativity, logic, and processing (both auditory and visual). These skills will be applied for the rest of their lives in everything they do and will determine their success in many areas. If a person does not sharpen these skills in the early years, it will be much more difficult to do during adulthood.
Learning to cook can actually encourage the use of all the aforementioned skills, which in turn will help develop cognition further. For example, counting out certain measurements, following a sequence of events and directions, and remembering how to use certain cooking tools will all sharpen your child’s cognitive abilities.
4. Language development
Language development is how your child understands and communicates. While children grow, their language skills continue to develop and this time plays a role in how well they are able to use and understand language later on in life. As each year passes, your child’s understanding and vocabulary will continue to expand, but only so far as you help them develop it.
During cooking, your child will have to utilize language in various ways. Children should be encouraged to talk about what they’re doing while making a recipe, thus sharpening their ability to communicate further.
Brain development and cooking can go hand in hand. A multi-faceted activity such as cooking can be a positive influence on how well your child learns certain motor and language skills and develops their cognitive abilities.
Featured image by Annie Spratt on Unsplash