Although my boys play with toy weapons all the time,
I rarely arm them with real ones.
One morning recently was an exception, however.
I gave both David and Tobin a small paring knife and showed them how to cut up cheese for the Caprese Salad we were serving to guests that evening.
I did not, however, give a knife to Shav; he got to play with measuring cups and other harmless kitchen gadgets instead. Although Tobin at three years of age was responsible enough for the privilege of using a knife, Shav at two seemed a wee bit too young for that. ;-)
David and Tobin seemed excited to use real knives...it kept them occupied productively, instead of squabbling...and it genuinely helped me out by reducing my preparation time for the salad.
A real win-win-win situation. ;-)
~ By the way, if you want to involve your children more with household tasks, teaching and training them to be proficient in skills that they'll use the rest of their lives, you might want to check out this article I read recently. It includes some wonderful lists of age-appropriate activities that children can be taught to do. I'll freely admit that I'm not there, when it comes to teaching my sons to do all of the things listed for their age group. But I'm *getting* there. ;-)
7 comments:
I am new to you blog and just wanted to say it is amazing. I love the colors. boys and knives are fun. we have what we call the blood zone and noone can be in your bloodzone when you are using a knife
I already enjoy having Susannah standing on the stool beside me sometimes when I'm working on something in the kitchen :) She plays with the measureing cup drawer (digging EVERYthing out!) and has so much fun, and I like to think she's also soaking in some early learning just from watching :) I'm looking forward to when she'll be old enough to "dump" and "stir" and be a little more hands on in appropriate situations :)
brave mama you are; i'm not sure i'd let myself use a knife at 3, LOL! i was a wild child. ;)
What great helpers!!
Davene, its me Elizabeth, your long lost devoted blogger friend who has fallen so behind on your delightful blog and can't wait to catch up! I apologize for my extremely long absence! The boys are looking so big and adorable as ever! I am going to check out the article!
Much love sweet Davene!
Andrew was browsing your blog and noticed that Tobin was cutting with his left hand. Is he left-handed? I think it would be so neat if one or some of your boys are! I'm waiting to see if Marie is or not. Paul & Hannah are both right-handed. Of course, I'm left-handed and Andrew is right-handed. (And I am in no way superstitious about left-handers!)
Sally - it's funny; it wasn't until I read this post a day or so after I wrote it that I realized that David was using his right hand to cut, but Tobin was using his left. I hadn't noticed it before that! Kudos to Andrew for being observant. :)
I'm still not sure whether Tobin will be left-handed, although my dad and I (both lefties) are in favor of that. :) He sucks his left thumb, but I haven't paid attention to notice which hand he uses when he "writes." I'll have to watch him more closely next time he has a pencil or crayon!
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