Easy Toddler Baking Activity with Betty Crocker™
This post has been sponsored by Betty Crocker. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
I have a new toddler baking activity with Betty Crocker™ that I'm excited to share with you today! When Emmie was unexpectedly home with us last year, I became so into Toddler Lesson Plans. In fact, I have an entire Pinterest board dedicated to it here! Since we sold our house, it's been a whirlwind and activities have been on the back burner. However, we're starting to get settled and I'm back at it! Betty Crocker™ Birthday Cake Cookie Cups are perfect for toddler baking activities because they're quick, easy, and come in a convenient, all-inclusive kit!
Why I love toddler baking activities
After creating 8 weeks of toddler lesson plans (which you can find here), I learned that baking recipes are one of the best go-to activities. What I love about baking with Emmie is that the education is endless. It teaches:
Patience as ingredients have to be mixed at specific times
How to count ingredients
Ways to sort and discuss colors
Listening and understanding directions
Sharing with friends and family
Now that we're staying with my parents in the suburbs for the next few months, Meijer will be one of our go-to retailers! Meijer offers an app so you can easily shop to look for sales or preorder your items. The store is always clean and so well-organized. You can easily shop here for delivery or pickup!
20 Easy Activities to Keep Toddlers Busy
It’s a goal of mine to consistently create content for the blog, and I have been soo inspired by all of the positive feedback to share these lesson plans!
Get the Lesson Plans
Planning for a toddler baking activity
I created an easy video to walk through all of the simple steps, but you can also read on below!
I love that Emmie enjoys creating these things with me, and I absolutely love how this video turned out!
Picking an easy recipe is key to planning toddler baking activities. I prefer to find recipes that are about 3-5 steps long. I find that Emmie has an attention span for about 20 minutes worth of baking, which is about how long I plan our activities.
For our baking adventure, I grabbed three flavors from Meijer: Betty Crocker™ Birthday Cake Cookie Cups, Betty Crocker™ Rainbow Candy Cookie Cups and Betty Crocker™ Peanut Butter Fudge Cookie Cups.
It's funny because Birthday Cake is one of Emmie's favorite flavors, Rainbow Candy is one of Matt's favorite flavors, and Peanut Butter Fudge is my favorite flavor. I love baking with Betty Crocker™ because we can always baking something delicious together that everyone loves. Baking as a family is not only a great toddler activity, but it's fun to share with the grandparents, too.
How to have a smooth experience when baking with your toddler
Prep the ingredients before you invite your toddler to join you! I can't stress this enough! Kids are so excited for toddler baking activities that it's challenging to wait for ingredients to be separated. If you prep them in advance, it's significantly easier for your toddler to listen to instructions.
Ways to make toddler baking activities educational with Betty Crocker™
I love to make our family baking time hands-on. It's so kid-friendly. We always talk about the ingredients first and the process.
Have a dialogue about the process:
What are you making today?
How will you make it?
What is mommy or daddy doing vs. what kiddo will do?
What are the first few steps?
Now, count and talk about the colors:
What are the "before" ingredients (meaning what gets mixed for the oven) and what are the "after" ingredients (like icing)? Betty Crocker™ easily breaks everything out into an all-inclusive kit.
What colors do you see?
How many ingredients are there?
How many muffin cups are in the Betty Crocker™ case?
Have fun with the process!
Let your toddler mix the ingredients in a large bowl.
Then, have the parent lead all of the mixing of ingredients, but always let the toddler step in to stir at the end. I think it's so important to empower your child to be part of the process.
When you bake, explain to your toddler how ovens are hot and only adults touch them.
For icing any baked treats, like the Betty Crocker™ Birthday Cake Cookie Cups, ice them when your toddler can have sugar (aka not right before nap time). I love to bake with Emmie in the morning and then we ice our sweets in the afternoon.
At the end of the day, it's most important to have fun! Toddler baking activities are a great way to spend time together as a family, away from screens and just connect. I'm always so grateful for those times because they do grow up SO fast!!
