Fun & Educational Home school Ideas for Girls & Boys

Looking for a way to put a little spice in your homeschool? You and your children may enjoy making cookbooks that are not only educational but useful and fun.

Homeschool cookbooks are a wonderful way to teach your children about many different important topics. The result is a finished project that will become a treasured keepsake.

A Multidisciplinary Project

This project can be adapted to fit any subject that you and your children are studying. To incorporate social studies or history, for example, you could concentrate on recipes from one culture or time period, such as German Recipes or Recipes From the Renaissance.

Other areas that this project could provide practice for include reading, writing, handwriting, typing, conducting research, health, math and art.

Finding Recipes

Girls and boys of all ages will enjoy collecting recipes from a variety of sources.

If a relative makes a dish that your child especially enjoys, have your child send that person a written request for the recipe. This will provide writing and handwriting or typing practice.

Children can also find recipes in the cookbooks in your kitchen and those at your local library. The Internet is a good place to search for especially hard to find recipes.

Choosing Recipes

Encourage your children to choose recipes that are practical and healthy. This would be a great opportunity to introduce or revisit the USDA Food Pyramid and discuss nutritional needs.

Extras

Many cookbooks contain extras, such as measuring equivalents, suitable ingredient substitutes or helpful hints. Your children could include these extras in their homeschool cookbook or come up with ideas of their own. One fun example would be to list odd or little-known facts about the theme of the cookbook.

Putting It Together

Your child's age and preferences should be taken into consideration when choosing a style for your cookbook.

Younger children may enjoy fashioning a book out of construction paper and crayon drawn illustrations. Another possibility is to use a scrapbook or binder.

Older kids may prefer creating the book using a desktop publisher for the text and a graphics program for any artwork and then printing it out.

If possible, laminate the finished cookbook for safekeeping.

Double Duty

Homemade homeschool cookbooks make unique gifts for grandparents and other loved ones. If the finished product is not electronic, consider scanning each page in order to make copies for gifts. The people in your children's lives will appreciate receiving such a thoughtful and useful present.