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More Than Just a Yummy Treat

Catholic Charities' Sunnyside Child Development Center offers full-day childcare for children aged six weeks to five years old and serves children who could be considered "at risk" for poor developmental outcomes due to living in poverty and high crime areas. Therefore, Sunnyside Child Development Center's service niche in the community is providing quality and affordable childcare with a solid educational foundation that prepares the children for kindergarten and enables them to succeed in school.   
 
Our program provides comprehensive early childhood educational programming focusing on physical, cognitive, language, social, emotional, and self-help/life skills. As our public school environments become more rigorous and demanding, Sunnyside Child Development Center is addressing these needs to ensure young children enter school with the basic skills critical for success. When preparing the children for school, we utilize lessons and activities that are not only academic but also enable them to express themselves and develop positive self-esteem and life skills.   
 
In addition to the goal of academic readiness, we aim to improve and maintain the children's physical well-being. We are fortunate to have governmental and community partners to help us to achieve both goals. NYS DOH CACFP Program provides us with funding and resources to give the children nutritious meals and snacks while they are at daycare. We have worked with two other partners: Russell Sage College, which has provided nutrition programs, and RPI, which has provided STEAM programs for our children. 

Time to Bake

We recently successfully accomplished school readiness and physical well-being lesson objectives by baking cookies. STEAM activities have become increasingly prevalent in school curriculums, and there are so many fun STEAM food activities to share with children. Cooking with STEAM is something that especially complements lessons and helps to increase children's knowledge in science and math. Children are much more interested in activities with real-life and practical STEAM examples. Also, they're lots of fun! 
 
Baking incorporates a number of STEAM concepts. It helps children understand and practice basic math concepts, such as measuring and sequencing, and build language skills while discussing the activity with their teachers. Baking develops fine motor skills and enhances hand/eye coordination, and children begin to understand directions when following a recipe. Additionally, the children learn cooperation and proper hygiene when working together to prep and clean up their baking areas and wash their hands.      
 
Our cookie lesson started in the morning and continued during afternoon snack time with lots of discussion about how much fun we had baking. The children were so excited that putting on their aprons and prepping the work area took a little longer than expected. However, once everything was ready, there was no stopping them. The children actively participated in all of the cookie-making steps. They listened and followed the directions, measured and mixed the ingredients, and spooned the cookie dough onto the cookie sheet. They also helped with prepping and cleaning their work areas. The only thing they did not do was put the cookies in the oven. The most challenging step in the baking process was waiting for the cookies to come out of the oven and cool off. However, it taught them about patience, which was rewarded when they ate the warm cookies from the oven and again during their afternoon snack -along with some fresh fruit, of course.
 
We all agree that cookies make a good day even better, and this lesson certainly did. It was so much fun! It was an experience that the children might not have been exposed to outside of Sunnyside. The success of the lesson was summed up in the smiles and chocolate crumbs on the children's faces and one child's comment, "I wanted to give you a cookie, but I ate them all!"