Healthy Role Modeling in Science & Health Classrooms

1. Healthy Role Modeling in Science & Health Classrooms

2. Including Nutrition Education

3. Nutrition Ed in Science - Preschoolers • Plants give us food. • Healthy foods give us energy and make us strong!

4. Nutrition Ed in Science & Health - Elementary School • Information about plants and farming. • Use MyPlateas a tool to introduce healthy foods. • Compare and contrast foods that people eat vs. foods that animals eat, food that plants eat, food that fish eat, etc.

5. Elementary Students, cont. • Let students become the teachers • Host a small nutrition/physical activity-related science fair • Healthy foods provide more efficient “fuel” for the body • Discuss what a calorie is and how many are burned in different activities

6. Nutrition Ed in Science & Health - Middle/High School • Grow a garden or help younger children start a garden • Nutrition relating to human anatomy & physiology, cell growth & development, etc.

7. Middle/High School Students, cont. • Explore how unhealthy foods can affect the body • Weight • Heart disease • Cancer • High cholesterol • High blood pressure • Calorie discussion and activity • Cooking activities in chemistry

8. Calorie Activity • Definition of a calorie • How many calories are in some fast foods? • How much activity does it take to burn half the calories you consume?

9. Food Safety • Fits easily into science classes for all grade levels • Young children – learning the importance of hand washing • Older students – Types of foodborne illness and how to prevent them • Fight Bac! campaign from Partnership for Food Safety Education

10. Including Physical Activity

11. Physical Activity in Science - Preschoolers • The body and its parts • Benefits of exercise (strong bones & muscles, etc.). • Demonstrate body movements • Hands-on lessons and “experiments” • Gardening activities • Activity’s effect on the body

12. Preschoolers, cont. • Have students demonstrate their favorite sports/activities. • Discuss how it is good to move and not sit at a TV or computer for too long

13. Physical Activity in Science & Health – Elementary School • When learning about the body, talk about exercise and how it affects the body (bones, muscles, etc.). • Watch muscles shorten to lift an object or bend a joint. • Feel muscles lengthen during a stretch.

14. Elementary Students, cont. • Discuss calories with students. What are they and how does our body use calories? • Make it real: compare different activities (walking, jumping, stair-climbing, etc.) to show how muscles have to work harder in some activities than others.

15. Elementary Students, cont. • Hold a nutrition/physical activity-related science fair.

16. Physical Activity in Science & Health – Middle/High School Talk about it… • Discuss the physiology of exercise and how it affects the body. • Talk about the definition of a calorie and how many calories are burned doing different activities. • Explore how sedentary behaviors can affect the body (weight control, chronic disease, etc.).

17. Middle/High School, cont. …Then get moving! • Build “human molecules” • Mimic the movements of planets/moons in the solar system • Get outside! • Make up an anatomy dance

18. Middle/High School, cont. Explore how sedentary behaviors can affect the body • Weight control • Chronic disease, etc.