Cora has always wanted to help me make dinner, 
literally since she started toddling around, she’s been my shadow come 5 pm.
For a while I tried to fight it; I had her watercolor, draw, or play games while I cut, mixed, and prepared our meal. And sometimes I still do that if I know there’s absolutely nothing she can do to help.
But most days, I have her help me–in any way she can:
- Cora Counts in the Kitchen: Usually if I’m cutting veggies, I’ll have her do something as simple as counting with me. On the potato day, we started by counting all four potatoes, then we counted as I cut.
And then I had Cora count as she put the pieces in the bowl.
We never count too high. If there are a ton of pieces, we’ll count to ten, and then we count to ten in Spanish. . .
. . . then ten or twenty in English again.
Sometimes we count as we cut peppers. . .
. . . and then bag them.
And when we make muffins or cupcakes, we count as I fill the the tin–and here’s another chance to demonstrate how we move from the left to the right!
Just another teeny-tiny way of sneaking in some learning while doing every day things. . .
Cooking is a wonderful way to connect with math! Even when I make sandwiches, I show our 3 year old that I can cut it in different ways. So no surprise when one day she says,"Mom, can you cut it two times so I can have four little squares?" One time she asked for two rectangles by cutting in half. It just makes sandwich making a little more fun!
Please link up any of your wonderful math activities with us! Love your blog!
http://joyfullearner.blogspot.com/2010/03/math-week.html