How to Make Healthier Food Choices

2-203

Laura Meletiadis

INTRODUCTION

Children are not eating the healthy foods they need to eat to become big and strong. Children are less healthy than they used to be and as a result there are now more obese children and more children with diabetes. Your class is becoming nutritionists. You are responsible for figuring out how to make healthier food choices. Right now there are some unhealthy foods that students are eating and all these unhealthy foods are leading to childhood obesity. Obesity means that your weight is higher than a healthy amount. Together, you are going to figure out how you can make healthier choices to combat childhood obesity and live a longer and healthier life.

TASK

It is your job to research and figure out what healthy foods students should be eating and what foods they should eat less of. Why are healthy foods better for you? You are going to research these foods and then create a collage of the foods that are the best for our growing bodies. You will also write a poem to teach others about making better choices. You will do all of this in 2 weeks time.

PROCESS/RESOURCES

Using the PPA Process, you will follow the six steps to solving the problem of students not making healthy choices. The six steps of the PPA Process are: define the problem, gather the evidence, identify the cause, evaluate the existing policy, develop a solution, select the best solution.

1. Define the problem & 2. Gather the evidence

Students are not making healthy food choices. What exactly does this mean? Why is making healthy food choices a better option?

Let’s watch this video to learn more.

https://youtu.be/TsZlTe_4LTU?si=T4u-0Cz6j4ogzcmc

Create a circle map to tell what unhealthy food choices the girl in the video is making.

3: Identify the causes

What causes childhood obesity?

https://youtu.be/B4yLyonZtHM?si=H3kA6p9i5X6D4LSU

Watch the video as a class and then make a circle map with your group and tell all the causes of childhood obesity?

4. Evaluate an existing policy.

Let's look at some recommendations from the government (USDA) about what kids should be eating on a daily basis.

Biology for Kids: Nutrition (ducksters.com) (nutrition and food information with quiz)

5. Develop a Solution

With your team create a collage of foods that students should eat on a daily basis. In addition, write a poem about the importance of staying healthy.

EVALUATION

RUBRIC

4	3	2	1
Covers the topic in depth with many details and examples. Subject knowledge appears to be excellent.	Covers the topic with details and examples. Subject knowledge appears to be good.	Covers some of the topic with some details and examples. Subject knowledge appears to be lacking.	Covers little of the topic with few or no details and examples. Subject knowledge appears to be minimal.
You used many details and descriptions.	You used some good details and descriptions but could have used more.	You used minimal details or descriptions.	There were no details or descriptions.
You spelled everything correctly. Grammar and punctuation are also correct.	You made one or two spelling mistakes and one or two errors in your grammar or punctuation.	You made a few mistakes in spelling, grammar and punctuation.	There were many mistakes.

CONCLUSION

1. Why are making healthy food choices important?

2. What is childhood obesity?

3. What are some healthy foods we can eat?

STANDARDS

2W6: Develop questions and participate in shared research and explorations to answer questions and to build knowledge.

2W7: Recall and represent relevant information from experiences or gather information from provided sources to answer a question.