To think knowing about food and being able to cook are key life skills?

[Notcontent]

This is something I strongly believe in, but I think that notwithstanding various small-scale initiatives to teach young people and families about healthy cooking etc the lack of skills is getting worse not better.

I was listening to a Radio 4 programme the other day about child food poverty and they were talking to some young people - one of the teenage girls talked about the fact that until recently she couldn’t cook anything)no and I also had little idea of what a normal meal should be.

This seems such wide-spread problem. So many people think of food as being readymade, processed things that you unwrap and eat.

I think that there should be education about this at schools as obviously many people are not getting these skills at home. It’s so important - eating is what keeps are alive.

Oh, yes. Home Economics lessons.

Go home with your list of ingredients for next week.

'You don't need that'

'We don't eat that'

'Who do they think they are, thinking people can waste money on that sort of thing?'

'Ewwwww. You'll poison yourself eating that'

'Don't think you'll be making a mess and setting fire to the house by cooking here with your Home Economics rubbish'

'They're making a fuss about nothing with all this washing up and drying and aprons and cleaning surfaces like everybody has a huge kitchen and servants'.

I spent three years getting up early and sneaking out various knives, cutters and other tools to make what I cooked better, along with scrounging the money from my older brothers for ingredients to buy at lunchtime and sneak into the Home Economics fridge. But I knew I wouldn't be able to keep that up for GCSE, so dropped the subject (as I did for anything that required money).

Were it not for those lessons aged 11 to 14 and an HE teacher who said she thought I was actually very good, lending me some cookbooks/recommended some programmes when they were on, I would have left school without the slightest clue. As it was, due to my mother taking herself off to bed with a bad back when I was 13 and not coming downstairs until I was nearly 16, I learned what I needed to be able to feed myself properly.

The baffling thing was that the house was full of gadgets and tools for cooking. They just weren't used - so I'd have to smuggle them out of the house, use them in school and then smuggle them back in again.

So I do think that cooking, preparing food, food hygiene and the like are important skills. Interestingly, at the poorest schools I've worked at, the lowest achieving cohort (BAME Boys) absolutely loved their Food Tech and Food Prep and Nutrition lessons and many got top grades - but the school/faculty did provide far more ingredients than is usual, out of their meagre budget, to make it possible for them to do so.

Some schools don't even have food tech rooms anymore. But kids learn functional literacy, numeracy, science, design and how to cook through the subject - suddenly, the mysteries of fractions make sense when there's a cake involved, for example.

So I think it is necessary. Just as calculating percentages goes on to calculating compound interest (and the teacher used it to illustrate for us why storecards were a daft idea, all the way back in the 1980s), or certain topics were planned with practical applications to grasp what the numbers and symbols meant, things that have a practical application NEED to be kept in the curriculum.

To be fair Laurie, there are youtube videos you can find very easily as basic as 'how to use a knife', 'how to chop an onion' etc. I think for those who have never cooked before and on a very tight budget, I think the bigger barriers to making their own spaghetti bolognese are more likely to be:

-Needing to buy the equipment - you'd need a sharp knife, chopping board, 2 saucepans which may not sound like much but would probably cost £15-£20 which might be more than a week's food budget - not everyone's parents set them up with all the kit/stuff for the kitchen when they first leave home.

-Needing to buy the ingredients in particular the herbs - once you have these they last for many meals but again an extra £2-3 can completely break the budget. Sites like girl named Jack are great for highlighting where you can leave out spices/herbs if you don't have them but more general ones like BBCGoodFood don't, and a novice cook won't necessarily know what's essential and what isn't. Plus if you aren't confident you/the kids are going to like what you cook, it can feel much safer to spend that £3 you have budgeted for mince, onions and tinned tomatoes on a big bag of chicken nuggets and one of chips which will guaranteed feed the kids for a few days.

-Finding the time both to shop, watch videos/read recipes and shop (I know most people can get to a big supermarket fairly easily but if you haven't planned ahead, get home from work and need to feed everyone (and don't have a car) it can be much easier to go to local corner shop or fast food place for processed food...

Not saying all this is right or can't be fixed and therefore nothing should ever change/there is no hope, but I don't think education is the only solution...

To be fair Laurie, there are youtube videos you can find very easily as basic as 'how to use a knife

I’m sure there are. However for practical skills like this there’s nothing more effective than someone standing there beside you, helping you get it right. YouTube doesn’t do that.

I agree with the rest of your post.

I bet you there are youtube videos on how to use toilet.

EVERYTHING is online. Maybe rather than cooking there should be lessons in self sufficiency and can do attitude.

My two children used to like cooking when they were young teens, Sometimes a mash up, but often quite good.When they went to Uni, it all probably went haywire, when they were sharing kitchens with other students.They probably had beans on toast and some wine for dinner.
They are in their 40's now.and still like cooking.

When I was at school in the 1950 era, and was about 12 or 13, we had cookery lessons once or twice a week, it was an all girls school. The boys over the way never did cookery, they had to have woodwork or metal work. Some of the boys wanted to do the cookery, but were not allowed to in those days. They just ate our cakes or puddings on the way home from school. !!

I agree it’s an important life skill.

I do not think schools necessarily (either primary or high school) have the time, money, staff or facilities to facilitate this learning.

I home educate my children and life skills are quite important to us. Myself and DH teach our children to cook, do chores/housework, garden, diy and so on.

I appreciate that if you are working forty+ hours a week and kids are at school all day and then home work in the evening, plus clubs there is not a lot of time for these things. But I do think that it’s more down to parents than schools.

I dont think its necessarily parebt cant cook therefore child cant. My mum cooked very well but didnt want us involved. I taught myself with delias books. Its not a school or gov issue. Id rather self defence, first aid, sexual ed and mental health support than cooking lessons.

I agree OP.

DP and I were both cooked for every evening as children, but both of our families were a big fan of routine and beige food. We are a fan of neither now and enjoy learning new cooking skills.

Needing to buy the equipment - you'd need a sharp knife, chopping board, 2 saucepans which may not sound like much but would probably cost £15-£20

You can buy all these things in the pound shop.

I think the mechanics of cooking are very easy to self teach, as there are so many resources. However, in my experience the adults who 'can't' cook derive no enjoyment from the process and indeed don't like the things they make when they do try because it's not up to the standard of a restaurant (due to being beginners).
Besides the actual basic skills my parents taught me how enjoyable it is to cook. They love home cooked food, and I just grew into that. Trying to replicate that at school would be quite tricky I think.

Always remember being on a story in an impoverished city in some high rise blocks way out of town. Around came a grocery van full of pappy white bread, no fresh food and tins of beef in gravy or chicken ditto. Potatoes maybe. All of it expensive. But cheaper than paying bus fares with a couple of kids in tow to somewhere with less expensive and better produce. Or not being able to cook at all because there's no stove. And a bag of fries with salt and vinegar and fried sausages from another van was cheaper still. Which is why I like Jack Monroe. But if you are very poor, being taught nutrition in class probably makes no sense at all. I like the LondonJax school.

Yes, of course they’re basic life skills. Given that fewer and fewer people actually cook from scratch any more, there should probably be cookery classes for all secondary pupils, for a year or two.,,

However when adults say they ‘can’t’ cook, I feel like saying, ‘Oh, dear, can’t you read?’ Because if they really wanted to, anyone of average intelligence could learn by following simple recipes - e.g. from Delia’s How to Cook, not to mention all the online help for just about everything now.
I suspect that it’s more often a case of CBA.

I think it is an important life skill. I see it with a friend of mine. She honestly has no idea about what is healthy eating and has two kids who are addicted to Junk food. Her children now have serious heath issues that are caused by their weight.

I agree. I think it is down to parents now having to work such long hours that they dont have time to cook, let alone teach kids to cook. If you get home at 6pm and the children have had dinner at nursery, then you put them to bed and make something for the adults. The children dont even see adults preparing food. It shouldn't be up to the schools to teach this, or the government to provide intervention.

Also there seems to be an issue, particularly with men, where being unable to cook is somehow almost a badge of honour. "DH could burn a boiled egg hahaha aren't men rubbish at cooking". My husband was never taught to cook by his mum - if he lived alone he would subsist on freezer food and jars of pasta sauce.

This is one of the reasons I'm glad DS is taking food tech as an option. It's more than just cooking - he'll learn meal planning, budgeting, dietary needs too. We've always encouraged him to cook and bake with us. When he gets the choice of what to cook as homework he usually chooses the harder option to stretch himself.

I think the big issue in UK is late start and finish at work. My parents worked fulltime. 42.5 hours. But the work starts at 8 and finishes at 4:30 (includes 30 min lunch). So you are home bit earlier and have time to cook. My mum used to batch cook though and it was just heated up or prep stuff night before so it's faster. Or my dad cooked.

Why dont the teach it in schools too? When i was there boys and girls had cookery lessons from the 1st to 3rd form.

My DD1 has no interest. Tried and tried and shes now 18, my 16 yr old will cook and loves it. Welsh cakes are her favourite and curry too.

Its in some, not others. Same as a lot of things.

Being able to cook wouldnt solve the obesity crisis. I am a pretty good cook and certainly confident to cook. I was still obese because I liked to cook unhealthy food (desserts, sauces with cheese and cream, oily stuff like toad in the hole etc. Etc.), because I liked snacks and treats in the evening and because I drank too much. There is no one size fits all solution here.

It also saves an absolute fortune if you know how to cook. This needs to be a huge selling point. Along with obvious health benefits!

When my kids grow up and leave home I'm never going to cook again. I'm going to eat out every night or get a delivery. At the moment I cook most meals, I don't mind and don't actively dislike it but there are other things I'd rather be doing. I'm going to join the cba to cook club.

I think that there should be education about this at schools as obviously many people are not getting these skills at home

So yet again schools are there to take the place of inadequate parents! How many more parental responsibilities are going to be dumped onto schools? Maybe parents should be encouraged to get off their backsides occasionally.

How many more parental responsibilities are going to be dumped onto schools?

Well you could argue that it’s a parents responsibility to teach their child everything, but schools were established to ensure that quality education was available for all.

I don’t see this as an addition for teachers, but that something should be deprioritised for it. I’d say this is more important than an awful lot of what’s taught in schools these days.

And the fundamental reason is to educate those children whose parents are not capable of teaching their child to cook. Not too lazy.

I think it's a basic life skill, but developing it relies on having parents, or grandparents, with the time, skills and money to teach it to you.

During lockdown we've had lifeskill classes for DC 6 and 10, alongside schoolwork. They know how to do a basic washing machine run, how to plan and budget a week's menus, and buy them on-line, finding good bargains. DC10 has always enjoyed baking, and started doing some salads and simple meals as a 9 year old, but has gone cooking crazy in lockdown. She now, entirely independently, bakes cakes, flapjacks, cookies, bread. And she can do a pasta sauce from scratch, curry from scratch etc. She's using the oven and hob independently, microwave, electric whisk etc, follows recipes from books or BBCgoodfood. She's not allowed to boil water, use a blowtorch, or the food processor. She is also learning to clean up as she goes. She's been a lifesaver actually as we're working long hours.

My parents made me do the supermarket shopping (they provided the money) and prepare family meals from scratch, in the holiday between A-levels and going to uni. So when I got to uni I had a selection of meals I could do (omelette, risotto, pasta sauce, curry, bread etc, which made me relatively sophisticated in student terms). Thankfully DH's mother also taught him to cook.

Why don't schools teach it?

1. Curriculum squeezed by ever more demands to teach citizenship, PSHE, financial budgeting, British values
2. Buildings and equipment.. Lack thereof
3. Huge class sizes
4. Providing ingredients.. If you ask the kids to bring it, many won't for a myriad of reasons, some more valid than others. If you source it centrally, where's the budget? And who goes to buy it?
5. Allergies, health and safety over hot and sharp.
6. Ethical concerns.. Someone will be that parent who complains that the food isn't vegan, organic etc.

I 100% believe its a basic life skill and have taught it to 6th formers as a prelude to uni life, very much off my own bat and as a voluntary extra course that kids paid for to cover the ingredients, which I shopped for. However the above issues are just some of why it doesn't get taught in schools any more.

My mother taught me and my siblings to cook from a young age, as I taught my own children.
She also used to take me shopping with her and taught me how to choose a good cut of meat and how to budget.
My M.I.L was a typical fifties housewife who did everything domestic. Unfortunately when she died my F.I.L could barely put together beans on toast due to that.
It's important to be able to cook, even if not Michelin chef standard, at least to a decent basic level.
Everyone is capable of learning, I just think some people don't want to learn.
To be honest, I hate cooking. When I met my husband I tried to get out of it by saying I couldn't be cook ( he's a wonderful cook ) but unfortunately he wasn't buying it ☹️