Cooking for Independence Program
$579.00
The Therapy at Home Cooking for Independence Program has been specially designed by our occupational therapists to guide children through five extensive cooking projects based around the following meals: breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert and snacks.
Using the step-by-step videos and recipe cards with supporting visuals, children will be supported to gain independence and confidence in the kitchen and build skills for daily living.
Created for ages 5 – 20 years old.
An Outcome Report and a block of Group Telehealth Sessions are included with this program.
- Description
- What's in the toolbox?
- What are the benefits?
- What are the goals?
- What skills will we build?
- Telehealth
- Outcome Report
The Therapy at Home Cooking for Independence Program focuses on developing a range of skills and knowledge related to cooking. Throughout the program, children will work through five projects to create meals from scratch and build confidence and independence along the way.
The online videos and recipes cards with colour visual instructions will be used to support children to create the following meals to share with the family:
Breakfast - scrambled eggs & fried eggs
Lunch - mini quiches
Dinner - taco tortilla bowls
Dessert - coconutty bliss balls & chocolate bliss balls
Snacks - chocolate chip muffins & berry muffins
The comprehensive facilitator guide offers suggestions for shopping lists and substitutions, as well as tips for exploring new foods and managing mealtimes.
Throughout the program, there is an emphasis on kitchen hygiene, knife safety, measuring ingredients and following instructions.
The Cooking Journal provides children with a practical tool for developing planning skills. It allows children to use all senses to reflect on the meals that they prepare and encourages the use of a guided reflection process for understanding successes, challenges and improvements. In doing so, it creates an opportunity to develop a deeper understanding of personal food preferences.
As a culminating activity, the Pocket Money Board game provides children with a fun and interactive tool for further building confidence and independence with tasks for daily living. It is an opportunity for the whole family to connect and share not just the food that is created, but money skills for lifelong independence.
NOTE: In addition to Cooking for Independence, Therapy at Home offers a suite of cooking programs:
If your child has keen interest in cooking, these programs can be explored for further skill development in these areas.
The Cooking Program focuses on introducing children to key baking processes using carefully selected baking mixes and is suitable for beginning cooks.
There is also the Cake Masters Program that can be delivered in conjunction with or as an introduction to Cooking for Independence and focuses on baking and decorating novelty cakes from scratch.
PLEASE NOTE: The essential components of the toolbox generally don’t change over time unless we are making improvements to the overall program. The specific tools included may differ at times in terms of brand, colour, and other cosmetic differences due to sourcing factors out of our control. This will not affect the therapeutic benefits of the program as intended for the participant. We recommend you only order one program per child to ensure the appropriate use of funds. We cannot tailor toolboxes or programs to suit specific requests at this time. If you order a program for multiple children they will receive the same program and toolbox. All shop listing images are representative of the program theme and not necessarily literal representations of what’s in the toolbox.
What's in the toolbox?
The Therapy at Home Cooking For Independence Program comes with a toolbox of resources delivered to your door that aligns with the skill building modules in the online program. This toolbox provides a practical and playful element that your child can engage with as they follow along with the videos.
The toolbox includes*:
✓ Divided serving container for meal time exploration
✓ Muffin tin, muffin cases and spatula for use in cooking projects
✓ Mini tongs for incidental hand strength
✓ Knife and safety glove to promote cutting skills
✓ Dishwashing brush and tea towel to promote kitchen maintenance
✓ Recipe card set including colour visual instructions for all procedures
✓ Facilitator guide including framework for skill development and helpful facilitator tips for mealtimes
✓ Cooking Journal for planning and reflection
✓ Pocket Money board game for learning important and foundational concepts about money
* The essential components of the toolbox generally don’t change over time unless we are making improvements to the overall program. The specific tools included may differ at times in terms of brand, colour, and other cosmetic differences due to sourcing factors out of our control. This will not affect the therapeutic benefits of the program as intended for the participant.
For allergen-free families, the Facilitator Guide provides tips and suggestions for gluten, dairy, egg and nut-free variations.
What are the benefits?
The Therapy at Home Cooking For Independence Program aims to deliver the following benefits:
✓ Increased independence as children follow the step-by-step guided videos and visual instructions to prepare meals from scratch
✓ Skills for daily living built through a framework of skill development design to move children from assisted to independent in the kitchen
✓ Opportunity to explore real and new foods using all of the senses through using a variety of ingredients and meal preparation methods
✓ Enhanced confidence as children share a meal with their family and say ‘I made this myself!’
What are the goals?
The Therapy at Home Cooking for Independence Program focuses on skill development in the following areas:
✓ Develop self confidence in skills for daily living
✓ Increase skills and safety when using a knife to cut ingredients
✓ Develop measuring knowledge and skills
✓ Increase ability to follow instructions
✓ Enhance awareness and practices for hygiene in the kitchen
✓ Develop executive function including planning, organising and sequencing
✓ Increase awareness of time
✓ Progress from one stage of learning about a new or non preferred food to another stage along the continuum – ie., avoidance → tolerating → trying → enjoying → choosing
View the Therapy at Home NDIS Goals Guide to see where your child’s NDIS goals align with our range of Therapy at Home programs.
What skills will we build?
The Therapy at Home Cooking For Independence Program focuses on skill development in the following areas:
✓ Kitchen tool skills including knife safety, cutting techniques and measuring
✓ Hygiene skills including washing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen
✓ Fine motor skills including chopping, cracking eggs and opening packets
✓ Planning and reflection including preparation of a shopping list and meal reflection
✓ Sensory exploration and food exposure through a variety of ingredients and methods
✓ Confidence and connectedness sprinkled throughout the scaffolded experiential process
Telehealth
This program includes a block of Group Telehealth Sessions to support you in successfully implementing this program. To read more about the Group Telehealth inclusion please visit our FAQs.
Outcome Report
This program comes with an outcome report for NDIS review purposes.
Parents/guardians must submit online questionnaires measuring the child’s progress before and after the program as a requirement for obtaining the outcome report.
Find out more about how to use your NDIS funds for this program HERE
Therapy at Home provides the option for an outcome report to be included with all Programs. These reports are a summary of the specific program outcomes measured as a result of participating in a specific Therapy at Home Program. This is not a report for decision-making at the full plan level. This is not a report for an end-of-plan review from which a planner can use to make decisions about future funds at a whole plan level.
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