 |
|||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
|||||||||
    |
Division of Nutrition AssistanceBalance Your Diet A boy, wearing a helmet, is riding a carrot-shaped skateboard, while balancing a carton of milk, an apple, a loaf of bread, and a chicken leg. Suggested Materials
Learning Activities 1. Design all-time favorite meals. Ask students to name their favorite foods. Then, ask them to name their all-time favorite meals. List the responses on the board. Divide the class into teams. Each team has the mission of coming up with its own favorite meal one that every student on the team would love to eat and that is balanced, meaning it contains at least one food from every food group. Teams present their meals and share the story of how they picked their meal. How easy was it to please every team member? Now they try and pick a meal for the class that everybody will enjoy. They soon see that picking a meal for everybody is not so easy. Most students will select foods such as pizza, hamburgers, and chicken nuggets. Ask the students why they should eat a variety of foods each day. (Answer: No one food provides all of the needed nutrients. For example, tomatoes provide vitamin C and beta carotene for vitamin A, but are not good sources of other vitamins and minerals. Eating a variety of fruits and vegetables is the best way to ensure getting all of the needed nutrients. ) Also, these favorite foods are not always the healthiest. Emphasize to students that, even when they eat from all of the five food groups, they should eat a variety of foods from each of the food groups. For example, from the Meat Group, they should not eat beef products only, such as hamburgers, ground beef tacos, steak, etc. Instead, they also should eat other foods in this group, such as chicken, fish, dried beans, and eggs. By choosing a wider variety within each food group, they are more likely to receive all of the nutrients needed for healthy diets. Students should remember that the Pyramid represents a daily diet, so they dont have to eat foods from every food group at every meal. However, they should try to have a variety of foods from every food group on a daily basis. 2. Discover variety in the lunchroom. How much variety is offered in the school lunch and breakfast menus for a week? The school lunch menus are designed to offer a variety of foods daily and over the course of a week. However, if the lunchroom offers a variety of menu options (examples, hot line, pizza, and hamburger, etc.), many students eat pizza or hamburger everyday. As a result, they will be provided with the same nutrients over and over. Emphasize that the students should take advantage of the variety of foods offered by the lunchroom. 3. Make a lunchroom tray or plate. Ask students to draw lunchroom trays or plates to represent their favorite healthy meals served at school. Display the pictures in the lunchroom. 4. Eat a variety of foods based on color. Encourage students to try different types of foods by focusing on a color. Once a week, declare a different color food day such as Red Day or Yellow Day and ask students to include as many foods of that color as possible in their breakfast, lunch, and snack meals. Involve the students in helping to plan sample menus based on the color of the day. On Red Day, for example, ask the students to name as many foods as they can think of that are red, and list their ideas on chart paper. Invite the students to draw pictures of their favorite red foods to display around the chart. Some examples include the following: a. Red Day kidney beans, lean meat, cranberry juice, red apples, strawberries, cherries, watermelon, tomatoes, radishes, beets b. Yellow Day bananas, scrambled eggs, papaya, corn, cornbread, yellow squash c. Blue Day blueberries, eggplant, blue corn tortilla chips d. Green Day spinach pasta, broccoli, celery, peas, green pears, kiwi fruit, lime gelatin e. Orange Day sweet potatoes, carrots, pumpkin, mangoes, oranges, orange juice f. White Day bread made with white flour, chicken, noodles, potatoes, cauliflower, vanilla yogurt, milk g. Brown Day brown rice, lentils, whole-wheat bread, baked beans, chocolate milk 5. Foods come in a variety of forms. Introduce the students to foods in different forms. Tomato products include fresh tomatoes, tomato sauce, tomato juice, tomato soup, and ketchup. Corn is another good example. Gather fresh corn, frozen corn, canned corn, cornmeal, and corn oil; or, select fresh apples, apple juice, apple butter, applesauce, and dried apples. Invite children to investigate the different foods you have gathered. As appropriate, let them feel, smell, and taste some of the foods. Talk about the items that come from the same food, such as the dried apples, apple juice, and applesauce. Let students share how they think the different products are made. |
|
|
| www.louisiana.gov | | | Louisiana Dept. of Education | | | © 2007 State of Louisiana | | | LDE Employee Web Mail | | | LDE Bids |