A. New research shows that three-quarters of British children do not know how to boil an egg. Many youngsters have no idea how long they should leave an egg on the hob for, with a quarter believing it should remain in the
saucepan for at least 10 minutes. A further 12 per cent of children admitted that they did not have a clue. The study also found that almost half of youngsters never or rarely help prepare evening meals, even though around a third of parents want them to take part.
B. The poll for the supermarket chain Morrisons said 37 per cent of children preferred watching television or surfing the internet to cooking. Two in five said they were too stressed about homework or too tired to help cook. But the most of parents don’t get offended as “we reap what we sow». Analysts say that the best contribution of money is a contribution to children’s education.
C. It also revealed that a third of parents had learned to cook from their own mothers and fathers, and 80 per cent viewed culinary ability as an important skill. Study author Annabel Karmel said: "Today's parents just don't have the time or the patience to get the children involved in the kitchen. A third of parents admit it's easier to let their children watch television than to enlist their help with the evening meal”. Teaching our children to cook helps prepare them for the future. Giving them these skills may help prevent them from getting stuck when necessity or principles call them to cook their own food.
D. Experts said that it is important to encourage children to take part in cooking as it helps them improve their
mathematical skills. It’s nearly impossible to cook without doing some math. Whether you’re cutting a whole recipe in half or just measuring out cups of flour, it’s a great way to give your kids a jump-start on math skills.
Cooking may help children see that math has a practical application in the real world — perhaps they’ll see that it’s not as abstract as they think!
E. What's more cooking is a great way to get fussy eaters to try new foods. By the age of six, children should be able to chop vegetables, grate cheese and boil an egg, and that by 13, youngsters should be cooking fish, chicken and meat and baking potatoes. By the age of 16 teenagers should have mastered risottos and pasta dishes. This is an opinion of the study author Annabel Karmel.
F. In the US and Europe, obesity among children has become problematic. Teaching children to cook encompasses such vital information as nutritional content, food preparation, and calorie information. Many children (and many adults, too!) simply don’t know how to prepare healthy food. For instance, if they are not taught proper cooking skills, kids may think that the only way to prepare potatoes is in the form of greasy fries. Learning to cook, they can pick up important information and skills, such as how to make oven fries, and/or how to incorporate sweet potatoes in various dishes as well as white potatoes.
G. Cooking helps to understand the concept of changing materials: liquid cake mix becomes a solid through baking, juice can become ice lollies when frozen and chocolate melts when heated. Cooking provides an excellent
opportunity to discuss where foods come from such as eggs or milk and how and where various foods grow. Children can learn many things through questions raised in the kitchen including what they need to eat to keep healthy.
