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Montessori-Inspired Food Art

July 12, 2012 By Deb Chitwood 31 Comments

Although this isn’t a traditional Montessori activity, I love the idea of Montessori-inspired food art for fun, creativity, and encouraging healthy eating. Montessori-inspired food art can be as simple or as complex as you and your child or students wish. It can be used as a creative activity in some form at any age.

Montessori-Inspired Food Art

Montessori-Inspired Food-Art Ideas

Montessori-Inspired Food Art (Tractor Design by Tom Parkin)

Montessori-Inspired Food Art (Tractor Design by Tom Parkin)

I’m art challenged, so I asked for help with this project. I simply provided healthy foods – fruits in this case – and asked my daughter and son-in-love to create designs. They’re adults, so their examples aren’t representative of preschoolers’ food art. But the concept is the same.

Fruit Flower (Design by Tom Parkin and Christina Chitwood-Parkin)

Fruit Flower (Design by Tom Parkin and Christina Chitwood-Parkin)

If you like, you can provide examples of food-art designs such as these in cards or photos according to your child’s ability to copy patterns. If you’d enjoy the process, you could make food-art design cards similar to the recipe cards in this post: Favorite Recipes for Preschoolers are Often the Easiest.

With counting and pattern matching, it could also be a math activity for preschoolers. If you’re wondering about having children copy food-art designs, read this post by Carolyn at Inspired Montessori and Arts at Dundee Montessori: Copying Makes Artists? YES!

You can vary the foods you provide on a tray for your child’s designs according to your child’s skills in food preparation. An activity such as the fruit flower would be for a child who could slice fruits unless you slice the fruits yourself. Here are lots of ideas to help your child develop food-preparation skills: Montessori-Inspired Food Preparation for Preschoolers.

After your children have created their food-art designs, I recommend leaving the finished creations in their snack area or on a low shelf of your refrigerator for them to eat as snacks. I definitely encourage the use of healthy foods for food art whenever possible. Food art increases interest in the food, and it’s always best when that food is healthy!

Have fun! 🙂

UPDATES: For more healthy-eating inspiration, I have a Montessori-inspired fruit unit and Montessori-inspired vegetable unit.

Fruit Pirate-Making Tray

Fruit Pirate-Making Tray

I set up a Montessori-inspired fruit pirate-making tray for a Fruit Pirate Ship (from Fit Body Full Life).

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Filed Under: Activities - Art, Activities - Practical Life, Kids in the Kitchen Tagged With: food art, food preparation, Montessori, Montessori-inspired food art

Previous Post: « Preparing Family Meals Together
Next Post: Montessori-Inspired Olympic Math Activities »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Malia {Playdough to Plato} says

    July 12, 2012 at 7:00 pm

    What a wonderful excuse for children to play with their food! I cannot wait to see what my oldest son creates. Thank you!

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 12, 2012 at 9:01 pm

      Thanks, Malia! I’d love to see what your son creates, too! 🙂

      Reply
  2. Isil says

    July 13, 2012 at 7:05 am

    What a great idea!My son would be chuffed to see that tractor and would love to try creating it.

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:48 pm

      Thanks, Isil! That’s the sort of thing my son loved when he was little, too! 😉

      Reply
  3. Suzanne says

    July 13, 2012 at 3:40 pm

    This is something I haven’t done with my buddies, I have made food art FOR them, but haven’t let them do it. I will have to try this!

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:50 pm

      Thanks for your comment, Suzanne! I’d love to see what your buddies come up with. Have fun! 🙂

      Reply
  4. Jodi says

    July 14, 2012 at 10:01 am

    This is so much fun. I have done food art for my kids before. I always do it for them though. I like the thought of encouraging them to play with their food.

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:51 pm

      Thanks, Jodi! I love to encourage healthy eating, and I think this is one of the most enjoyable ways to do it! 🙂

      Reply
  5. Jen Fischer says

    July 14, 2012 at 12:09 pm

    I love art activities that use food and keep it edible. I’ve often done a food caterpillar to butterfly activity where you make the caterpillar from grapes (with raisins stuck to toothpicks for the antennae), then make a butterfly using the caterpillar body and triangle toasts with grape jelly. You’ve got the transformation of the caterpillar and the transformation of the grape (raisins and jelly).

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:53 pm

      Thanks for your comment, Jen! Great idea … I love the transformation theme! 🙂

      Reply
  6. Jode says

    July 15, 2012 at 5:45 am

    What a fabulous post as always!! I am going to try this idea with my sensory challenged twin as food is a nightmare experience for me at the moment…perhaps i can turn it into fun!!

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:54 pm

      Thanks for your kind comment, Jode! I hope this works for you … kids are often much more likely to eat foods they prepared themselves. 🙂

      Reply
  7. stephanie says

    July 15, 2012 at 6:03 am

    Love any excuse to play with food! Will have to try this soon!

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:55 pm

      Thanks, Stephanie! I hope you have fun with it! 🙂

      Reply
  8. Carolyn says

    July 15, 2012 at 8:33 am

    This is awesome. My sons would love that tractor…right before it was gobbled up. I am heading to the farmers’ market, and will pick up the supplies for this!

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:55 pm

      Thanks, Carolyn! I’d love to see how it turns out! 🙂

      Reply
  9. In Lieu of Preschool says

    July 15, 2012 at 7:05 pm

    Love this! What a simple and fun idea! 🙂

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 16, 2012 at 11:56 pm

      Thanks so much! It is amazing how simple it is to prepare food-art activities! 🙂

      Reply
  10. Rachel says

    July 17, 2012 at 6:14 pm

    Ahhh… food! It has been a tricky issue in our house; my little one would simply rather not eat! Maybe this would make it a little more enticing. I will have to see!

    I’d love to have you link up at my Teaching Time for Toddlers post!

    http://philwife.blogspot.com/2012/07/teaching-time-for-toddlers-magnets.html

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 17, 2012 at 11:14 pm

      Thanks for your comment, Rachel! Kids are more likely to want to eat healthy foods they prepared themselves … especially when their meal or snack is a unique creation. I hope it works for you! 🙂

      Reply
  11. The Iowa Farmer's Wife says

    July 18, 2012 at 2:38 pm

    Oooh this is right up our alley! We LOVE playing with food!

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 30, 2012 at 7:56 pm

      Thanks for your comment! You do a great job of playing with food … I always love to see what you’ve created! 🙂

      Reply
  12. Pauline says

    July 18, 2012 at 11:22 pm

    Thank you for sharing this wonderful post with the Weekly Kid’s Co-op Deb. I will feature this post as part of my roundup of this week’s linky party and also pin a picture from your post onto our very popular Weekly Kids’ Co-op Pinterest board :).

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 30, 2012 at 8:00 pm

      Thanks so much for your kind words and for featuring my post, Pauline! I really appreciate it! 🙂

      Reply
  13. tricia says

    July 20, 2012 at 8:33 pm

    Playing with food and doing art at the same time? Perfect. 🙂

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 30, 2012 at 8:00 pm

      Thanks, Tricia! It has to be one of my favorite ways to do art! 🙂

      Reply
  14. Mom to 2 Posh Lil Divas says

    July 20, 2012 at 9:02 pm

    as always fun ideas shared Deb. My girls LOVE to make art with their fruits. I am featuring this on this weekend’s Sunday Showcase as part of my Fun Food features! Thanks so much for sharing with us.

    Reply
    • Deb says

      July 30, 2012 at 8:01 pm

      Thanks so much, Bern! I really appreciate your featuring my food art post! 🙂

      Reply
  15. BJ says

    August 17, 2012 at 4:30 pm

    Tom and Christina’s fruit flower looks amazing! Such creativity and deliciousness all in one! 😛

    Reply
    • Deb says

      August 21, 2012 at 12:11 am

      Thanks, BJ! It was lots of fun doing a project together with Tom and Christina! 🙂

      Reply
  16. Gude says

    August 16, 2014 at 3:02 pm

    How fun! I LOVE that berry tractor 🙂
    Thanks for sharing at the Mumsnet linky.

    Reply

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