Cooking Class
Raina's class invites parents to cook a snack with the 20 kids once a week. A parent selects a day and then is responsible for planning and executing a cooking adventure for the 20 kiddoes. Theoretically, the snack is healthy (since the kids are eating it at 9:30 a.m.) and allows the kids to be involved in the actual preparation.
I'm a cook and I was scared off. Raina helps me cook all the time at home, but I very much am the person in charge and she "supervises" or oversees the process and occasionally participates by dumping in measured items or cleaning vegetables or something. Nothing huge, and I know my kid, so I know that these tasks are exciting for her and that she is very capable of them. But scaling her by a factor of 20 was too much. I really struggled to come up with a snack idea too. We do healthy snacks which are somewhat pre-prepared: fruit, cheese on crackers, carrot sticks, wheat thins. No cooking required.
I took Raina to a Parents as Teachers cooking class and discovered that we could make little bagel pizzas. The design was to trick kids to eat vegetables, but who cares? I finally had something that a bunch of kids could do and with which I was comfortable having my name associated.
Cooking day was today. I took plenty of bagels, sauce, and cheese, clearly too much mushrooms and peppers, and not enough pineapple. Raina, of course, piled everything on her pizza, whereas the other kids were scared of the vegetables. Oh well. The kids had fun, Raina was thrilled to have me there (after all the other moms had come repeatedly), and it was wonderful to watch Raina's class in its natural environment. Her classmates are adorably sweet and kind to each other and are remarkably creative.
I'm glad that we spent the morning cooking together, and I'm very glad that I only signed up for one cooking day!
I'm a cook and I was scared off. Raina helps me cook all the time at home, but I very much am the person in charge and she "supervises" or oversees the process and occasionally participates by dumping in measured items or cleaning vegetables or something. Nothing huge, and I know my kid, so I know that these tasks are exciting for her and that she is very capable of them. But scaling her by a factor of 20 was too much. I really struggled to come up with a snack idea too. We do healthy snacks which are somewhat pre-prepared: fruit, cheese on crackers, carrot sticks, wheat thins. No cooking required.
I took Raina to a Parents as Teachers cooking class and discovered that we could make little bagel pizzas. The design was to trick kids to eat vegetables, but who cares? I finally had something that a bunch of kids could do and with which I was comfortable having my name associated.
Cooking day was today. I took plenty of bagels, sauce, and cheese, clearly too much mushrooms and peppers, and not enough pineapple. Raina, of course, piled everything on her pizza, whereas the other kids were scared of the vegetables. Oh well. The kids had fun, Raina was thrilled to have me there (after all the other moms had come repeatedly), and it was wonderful to watch Raina's class in its natural environment. Her classmates are adorably sweet and kind to each other and are remarkably creative.
I'm glad that we spent the morning cooking together, and I'm very glad that I only signed up for one cooking day!
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