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An interactive activity for kids with bingo incorporated that involves the 5 major food groups.

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Learn about fats, proteins, vitamins & more

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Learn about fats, proteins, vitamins & more

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This video for students talks more about healthy eating and goes more in-depth in explaining macronutrients in a easy to understand way for kids.

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Healthy Eating for Kids - Learn About Carbohydrates, Fats, Proteins, Vitamins and Mineral Salts

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This link has great information about starting a garden with your students at your school. This is a great experimental learning opportunity!

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The Power of School Health Teams

School health teams come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and names (such as school health councils or wellness committees). But they all have a common goal: to rally forces to make schools healthier places for children. We recommend your school health team have between five and ten members, representative of your school, and the families or community you serve. Together, you'll identify primary health concerns, design, and lead projects that promote healthy habits, raise funds, celebrate successful health initiatives, and develop resources to help others replicate your efforts. Building school health teams is a crucial step in uniting school staff, parents and families to come together to create healthier environments for our children.

Building Your Team

"No meaningful family engagement can be established until relationships of trust and respect are established between home and school. A focus on relationship building is especially important in circumstances where there has been a history of mistrust between families and school or district staff, or where negative past experiences or feelings of intimidation hamper the building of partnerships between staff and parents." - Partners in Education, A Dual Capacity-Building Framework for Family-School Partnerships, SEDL, 2013

At the foundation of successful school health teams are strong family-school partnerships. Family-school partnerships bring together stakeholders at all levels within the community to identify barriers to family engagement and specific child health needs, then develop, implement, and evaluate effective and equitable solutions as a team.

Build a foundation of trust. Seek out input from parents and caregivers - and be prepared to listen and incorporate their feedback - about their cultures, concerns, needs, and relationships with schools. The responsibility to open communication with families falls directly onto school staff and leaders. Conversations with parents and other school staff should emphasize that every stakeholder has a different role to play in children's health both at school and at home. Be ready to adapt your programs and ideas to build mutual trust among school staff and parents and caregivers, which will lead to strong, lasting relationships between schools and families.

Get buy-in. Get others on your side by bringing people into the discussion on wellness. School leaders may agree that school wellness is important but say they don't have the time or resources to commit to it. Work with school staff, parents, and community members to take small steps towards creating big change. Use our bilingual resource on Making the Case for School Wellness (English | Spanish) to start the conversation.

Leverage existing momentum. Determine if you can expand on an existing wellness-oriented group or develop a plan to start your own. See if health and wellness can be added to an existing group, such as the PTA/PTO or school improvement team. If there isn't an existing health team, start your own. Identify more champions to join you, and build on their energy, passion, and expertise.

Discover a mutual platform and identify champions. Parents, caregivers, teachers, and school staff want the best for their children and students, and individually (and collectively) have the power and capacity to create a world where they can thrive. Understand what drives each person and ensure that your team represents the diversity of your community and has a deep understanding of the culture, norms, and dynamics. Acknowledge gaps in representation, evaluate recruitment strategies, and identify strategies to elevate the voices of community members who may not be able to make a regular commitment at this time.

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School health teams come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and names (such as school health councils or wellness committees). But they all have a common goal: to rally forces to make schools healthier places for children. We recommend your school health team have between five and ten members, representative of your school, and the families or community you serve.

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For this activity, students will use the code on the sheet to fill in the blanks to complete the sentences related to health!

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In this activity students will utilize their vocabulary to complete this crossword puzzle about MyPlate & healthy eating.

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In this game, students will learn about making healthy food choices and also get the opportunity to create a food plate in a fun game!

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Learn to make smart food choices with Kendra from CDC’s BAM! Body and Mind.

In each level you’ll sort foods coming down a conveyor belt into three categories: Go, Slow, or Whoa. Earn points by putting foods into the correct category.

Presented by BAM! Body and Mind, an online resource giving kids information they need to make healthy lifestyle choices. BAM! Body and Mind was created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
http://www.cdc.gov/bam/
http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/educational/wecan/eat-right/index.htm

Learn more about food and nutrition and other health topics for kids including diseases, physical activity, your body, and more.

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Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

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CDC BAM! Dining Decisions - Apps on Google Play

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Learn to make smart food choices with Kendra from CDC’s BAM! Body and Mind.

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While attempting to use foods from all 5 food groups, students will create their own MyPlate menu.

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In this word search students will identify different kinds of fruits and vegetables.

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This information can be used a resource to help students create a healthy eating plate.

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The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate is a visual guide to help educate and encourage children to eat well and keep moving. At a glance, the graphic features examples of best-choice foods to inspire the selection of healthy meals and snacks, and it emphasizes physical activity as part of the equation for staying healthy.

Building a healthy and balanced diet

Eating a variety of foods keeps our meals interesting and flavorful. It's also the key to a healthy and balanced diet because each food has a unique mix of nutrients-both macronutrients ( carbohydrate, protein, and fat) and micronutrients ( vitamins and minerals). The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate provides a blueprint to help us make the best eating choices.

Along with filling half of our plate with colorful vegetables and fruits (and choosing them as snacks), split the other half between whole grains and healthy protein:

The more veggies - and the greater the variety - the better.

Potatoes and French fries don't count as vegetables because of their negative impact on blood sugar.

More on vegetables >

Eat plenty of fruits of all colors.

Choose whole fruits or sliced fruits (rather than fruit juices; limit fruit juice to one small glass per day).

Go for whole grains or foods made with minimally processed whole grains. The less processed the grains, the better.

Whole grains-whole wheat, brown rice, quinoa, and foods made with them, such as whole-grain pasta and 100% whole-wheat bread-have a gentler effect on blood sugar and insulin than white rice, bread, pizza crust, pasta, and other refined grains.

Choose beans and peas, nuts, seeds, and other plant-based healthy protein options, as well as fish, eggs, and poultry.

Limit red meat (beef, pork, lamb) and avoid processed meats (bacon, deli meats, hot dogs, sausages).

It's also important to remember that fat is a necessary part of our diet, and what matters most is the type of fat we eat. We should regularly choose foods with healthy unsaturated fats (such as fish, nuts, seeds, and healthy oils from plants), limit foods high in saturated fat (especially red meat), and avoid unhealthy trans fats (from partially hydrogenated oils):

Use healthy oils from plants like extra virgin olive, canola, corn, sunflower, and peanut oil in cooking, on salads and vegetables, and at the table.

Limit butter to occasional use.

Dairy foods are needed in smaller amounts than other foods on our plate:

Choose unflavored milk, plain yogurt, small amounts of cheese, and other unsweetened dairy foods.

Milk and other dairy products are a convenient source of calcium and vitamin D, but the optimal intake of dairy products has yet to be determined and the research is still developing. For children consuming little or no milk, ask a doctor about possible calcium and vitamin D supplementation.

Water should be the drink of choice with every meal and snack, as well as when we are active:

Water is the best choice for quenching our thirst. It's also sugar-free, and as easy to find as the nearest tap.

Limit juice-which can have as much sugar as soda-to one small glass per day, and avoid sugary drinks like sodas, fruit drinks, and sports drinks, which provide a lot of calories and virtually no other nutrients. Over time, drinking sugary drinks can lead to weight gain and increase the risk of type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and other problems.

Finally, just like choosing the right foods, incorporating physical activity into our day by staying active is part of the recipe for keeping healthy:

Trade inactive "sit-time" for "fit-time."

Children and adolescents should aim for at least one hour of physical activity per day, and they don't need fancy equipment or a gym-The Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans suggest choosing unstructured activities for children such as playing tug-of-war, or having fun using playground equipment.

Overall, the main message is to focus on diet quality.

The type of carbohydrate in the diet is more important than the amount of carbohydrate in the diet, because some sources of carbohydrate-like vegetables (other than potatoes), fruits, whole grains, and beans-are much healthier than sugar, potatoes, and foods made from white flour.

The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate does not include sugary drinks, sweets, and other junk foods. These are not everyday foods and should be eaten only rarely, if ever.

The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate encourages the use of healthy oils in place of other types of fat.

About the Kid's Healthy Eating Plate

The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate was created by nutrition experts at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, based on the best available science, to enhance the visual guidance provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's MyPlate icon. The Kid's Plate reflects the same important messages as the Healthy Eating Plate, with a primary focus on diet quality, but is designed to further facilitate the teaching of healthy eating behaviors to children.

Kid's Healthy Eating Plate Terms of Use

We authorize permission to use the image of the Kid's Healthy Eating Plate in accordance with the following terms and conditions:

You must include the following credit line: "Copyright © 2015 Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. For more information about The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate, please see The Nutrition Source, Department of Nutrition, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/kids-healthy-eating-plate."

Your use of The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate is of a non-commercial nature.

Your use of The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate must comply with all applicable laws.

You may not modify the image or text in any way.

Harvard may revoke this permission at any time at its sole discretion. In the event that permission is revoked, you shall remove the image from any website or public space within no more than five business days.

Harvard strictly forbids any indication-either explicit or implied-that suggests or might cause others to believe that Harvard, the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, or The Nutrition Source website has endorsed any goods, services, individual, group, or organization of any kind. Therefore, you may not use the names "Harvard," "Department of Nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health," or "The Nutrition Source," or any Harvard-owned trademarks in connection with The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate without prior approval, in writing, except for reproducing the specific credit line for the image as set forth above.

You may not use The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate in any manner that could harm the reputation of Harvard.

Harvard disclaims all warranties of any kind (express, implied or otherwise) concerning The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate, including, without limitation, any implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Harvard University and its governing board members, officers, faculty members, students, employees and agents from and against all claims, damages, losses, liabilities, costs and expenses of every kind arising from or relating to your use of The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate.

Terms of Use

The contents of this website are for educational purposes and are not intended to offer personal medical advice. You should seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on this website. The Nutrition Source does not recommend or endorse any products.

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The Kid's Healthy Eating Plate is a visual guide to help educate and encourage children to eat well and keep moving. At a glance, the graphic features examples of best-choice foods to inspire the s...

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This video talks about healthy eating and introduces to kids the idea of a balanced diet.

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Healthy Eating: An introduction for children aged 5-11