Healthy Eating Week

Did you know that 10th-14th June is Healthy Eating Week? Run by the British Nutrition Foundation, this year's themes are:

• Get at least 5 a day
• Stay hydrated
• Move more
• Focus on fibre
• Reduce food waste

Healthy Eating Week in the Classroom

There are lots of ways to integrate Healthy Eating Week into your teaching, even if it’s just for 10 minutes each day. The benefits of a healthy diet are innumerable for growing children, and can even help them to learn better. We’ve come up with some quick Healthy Eating activities for you to try this week. We’d love to hear what you’ve been up to, let us know in the comments section below.

Food Rainbow

Eating a variety of different coloured foods can ensure that you’re getting a good range of fibre, vitamins, minerals and antioxidants in your diet. This can help keep bodies healthy and strong, as well as protecting against illness and helping to manage our weight.

Why not ask your class to try to name fruit and vegetables to match every colour of the rainbow? They could each then draw and colour an item of healthy food to create a food rainbow display for your classroom.

Potential choices could include:

Red:

Strawberries, apples, tomatoes, red peppers, raspberries, cherries

Orange:

Pumpkin, butternut squash, oranges, sweet potatoes

Yellow:

Lemons, melons, grapefruits, bananas, yellow pepper

Green:

Cabbage, broccoli, apples, grapes, courgettes, brussels sprouts, kiwis

Blue:

Blueberries, blackberries

Purple:

Plums, aubergine, grapes, cabbage, red onions

Mindful Eating

Focussing on what we eat and drink, being active and ensuring we get enough sleep may all have positive benefits on mental health. It can help support a healthy lifestyle, help raise self-esteem and boost a positive mood. A great way to develop a better relationship with food is mindful eating.

Eating has become an activity that we often do at the same time as something else. Most of us eat without mindfulness every day, eating just to satisfy our tummies before moving on to ‘more important’ tasks. Learning mindful eating brings us back into the present moment, freeing us to enjoy our eating experience. It aids good digestion and uptake of nutrients.

To practice mindful eating in the classroom, give each pupil a small amount of different healthy foods (taking into account any allergies or special food requirements). Ask the class to sit quietly and reflect for a minute on how the food came to be on their plates. Where did it come from? Who worked to grow/make it? What did it need to grow? They should give their meal or snack their complete attention. What colour is it? How does it feel in their hands or move around the plate? What does it smell like? Once they have answered these questions, they should take a bite of their food and examine the sensation of chewing and swallowing.

Healthy Rewards from PTS

PTS has a great range of awards for rewarding healthy eating choices and attitudes at school. This includes Scented Stickers, Healthy Choice Stickers and Lunchtime Awards, as well as rewards for Clean Plates and Empty Lunchboxes.

Take a look at our full Lunchtime and Playtime range here. Can’t see something you like? Check out our ‘Create Your Own’ Stickers and Certificates. The image bank has some great healthy eating images to choose from.