Cooking outside

Connect with nature and your imagination

Materials Required

Outdoor area
Cooking utensils: spoon, ladle, pots, pans
Natural Materials: sand/dirt, gumnuts, leaves, flowers

Optional materials

Measuring jugs, Measuring spoons, Other kitchen utensils

Play experience profile

Ages:
Min Playtime

30 - 45 Minutes
Skills

Mathematical, Cognitive, Sensory play
Energy Level

Active play
Messiness Rating
EYLF Outcomes

Learn More

Play Experience Preparation

With your child find spoons and pots to take outside - Fill up a jug with water (inside or outside).

Experience Steps

Find somewhere to do the cooking - leave you jug and cooking tools there.
Walk around garden talk about what ingredients can go in the recipe.
Collect different ingredients to go into the recipe (e.g. bark, sticks, flowers, dirt etc.).
Go to your cooking area once you've collected the ingredients.
Add different ingredients to water.
Mix ingredients with spoon together.
Try different amounts of dirt and ingredients you found in the garden.

What to talk about, or questions to ask during the experience

Talk about the texture of the mixes
What happens when different amounts of water and sand is added to water? What do you notice?

Build on this...

This can be used as an emergent mathematical activity, talking about different volumes of water and measuring the ingredients.

WHO guidelines for physical activity and sedentary behaviour
Provide evidence-based public health recommendations for children, adolescents and adults on physical activity. Learn more

Walking around the garden contributes to physical activity.

EYLF Outcomes
The Early Years Learning Framework has been designed for use by early childhood educators working in partnership with families, children’s first and most influential educators. View PDF

Children become socially responsible and show respect for the environment
Children resource their own learning through connecting with people, place, technologies and natural and processed materials

EYLF Principle

Principle 1: Secure, respectful and reciprocal relationships. Through a widening network of secure relationships, children develop confidence and feel respected and valued.

EYLF Practice

Practice: Learning through play. Play can expand children’s thinking and enhance their desire to know and to learn. In these ways play can promote positive dispositions towards learning. Children’s immersion in their play illustrates how play enables them to simply enjoy being.