E is for Eating: Themed Activities

I laughed when I came to do today's blog.  I forgot that I had chosen eating as the theme!  What do I do with that?  It is the most common thing in our lives, the centre of much of our socializing and a universal necessity for life itself!  Apart from the act of eating, what other activities can we do relating to the topic "E is for Eating"?  Well, here are a few ideas to get you started!

Eating games...such as pie in the face games, watermelon seed spitting contests, and chopstick challenges are fun.

Have a cooking competition, a cookie baking day or a multicultural food night (eg. Mexican or Italian)

Have a teddy bear picnic or a tea party with daddy and the dolls.

Try a science activity about structures by using marshmallows and spaghetti or sugar cubes and icing to compete to make the strongest or tallest buildings in a set amount of time.

A variation for 'buildings' is to create a gingerbread house for the holidays!

Sing songs about food like, 'If all the raindrops were lemondrops', 'Eat it', 'I like apples and bananas', 'Do you know the muffin man?', 'Do you like broccoli ice cream' and 'C is for Cookie'.

Have fun with rhyming words.  What rhymes with eat? meat, beans? greens, berry? cherry, ham? jam, bun? all done.

Have a hot chocolate night with a selection of flavours and toppings like marshmallows, whip cream, sprinkles and a candy cane to stir.

Create shopping lists for the grocery store to help the child participate in finding what you need and checking it off the list.

Give tasks like tidying up the pantry, arranging cans in order, washing their dishes or getting a snack.

Make your own play food and/or make up plates of food for others using toy food.

Have a set routine for meals: eg.wash hands, get water cup, take chair to the table, say a prayer, eat.

Discover the food groups and practice by putting toy foods or real ones into the right category.

Create a colour wheel or choose one specific colour and find foods that match each colour.

Create happy face plates, two green grape eyes, a carrot nose and an apple slice smile is one example.

Chewelry is an actual item for kids but we can make cheerio or popcorn necklaces as our own form of jewellery that we can chew!

Have a food fight?  Maybe we will keep that one off limits!

Do a sensory test.  With eyes closed, by smell or by taste, can you identify what the food item is?  Can you reach into a box and touch a food and identify it? 

Play an adjective game. How many clues does your partner need to guess the food item you have in mind?  For example: It is red.  It is juicy.  It is crunchy.  What is it? An apple.

Learn to follow instructions: Choose a developmentally appropriate recipe and follow the directions to make it.  It could be a peanut butter and jam sandwich or pudding or something more elaborate like  soup.

Find five books on your shelves that include food.  The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Thundercakes, Ten Apples Up on Top, Stone Soup and Green Eggs and Ham are five examples but there are many favourites that you can find and read with the child(ren) in your life.  

Above all, take this everyday activity, eating, and expand it to find even more ways to enjoy your time together, to learn and to grow as people.  May you not only connect as you prepare and eat your daily meals and clean up after them but may you also unite as you find other ways to enjoy the subject of eating at various other times as well.