Food Fun

Author(s):
Sandy Molnar and Jennifer Burke
Section # 23621

Grade Level:
3rd

Timeframe:
1 week - 5 days
90 minutes daily

Lesson Description or Explanation:
Compare personal eating habits with a balanced diet. Students will create menus for fictitious restaurants in small groups. The class will use them as a basis to order a healthy meal and calculate the calories of the meal. The students will understand how healthy nutritious foods help influence their daily food choices.

Indiana Curricular Standards:
Language Art:
3.4.2 - Discuss ideas for writing, use diagrams and charts to develop ideas, and make a list or notebook of ideas
3.6 - Students write using Standard English conventions appropriate to this grade level
Mathematics:
3.6.9 - Note the method of finding the solution and show a conceptual understanding of the method by solving similar problems.
3.2 - Students solve problems involving addition and subtraction of whole numbers. They model and solve simple problems involving multiplication and division
Science:
3.1.3 - Keep and report records of investigations and observations using tools, such as journals, charts, graphs, and computers.

ISTE Standards:
1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity
Teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments. Teachers:
Promote, support, and model creative and innovative thinking and inventiveness.
Engage students in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources.
Promote student reflection using collaborative tools to reveal and clarify students' conceptual understanding and thinking, planning, and creative processes.
Model collaborative knowledge construction by engaging in learning with students, colleagues, and others in face-to-face and virtual environments.

Assessments - Formative/Summative:
Formative Assessment:
Assessment will be the completed restaurant menus and food journals to be graded based on a rubric for effort, accuracy, presentation and ease of use.

Summative Assessment:
Later in the grading term, the class will revisit the Food Pyramid and their nutritional habits.
“Summative assessments happens too far down the learning path to provide information at the classroom level and to make instructional adjustments and interventions during the learning process.“ – http://www.nmsa.org/

Prior Knowledge:
Students must be familiar with the Food Guide Pyramid. Students must understand that food choices affect how they feel and how their bodies develop.
Basic calculator skills are necessary.
Appropriate computer use knowledge

Technology:
Internet Resources: http://www.mypyramid.gov

Hardware: Calculators, computers with internet access.

Software: Available programs with graphing capabilities. Example: Microsoft Office

Procedure:
One to Two weeks in advance:
Students will be motivated by the teacher reading several menus from local restaurants. The teacher will begin asking the students whether the meals sound healthy or not.

Day One: Healthy Eating Choices

-Teacher will review with the class the food pyramid and healthy eating concept.
-Teacher will discuss with the class some ideas of food they would like to see on a menu at a restaurant. (keeping in mind the healthy food pyramid concept)
Teacher will divide the class into groups of 3 or 4.
-Teacher will give the students the assignment to come up with a creative name for a fictious restaurant. Students will identify the food items that will be on the menu. These will be named and have a brief description. They will make the menu including a cover and prices for the food items.
-Students will begin writing in a personal food journal, documenting the types of food they consume, food group they food fit into, and the caloric intake of foods as available.

Day Two:

-Students will research and create a personal restaurant menu using mypyramid.gov to make healthy and nutritious decisions.
-Student will work on visual presentation. Ideas include: skits, PowerPoint, digitally drawn art, ClipArt interpretations, etc.
-Students will continue writing in food journal.

Day Three:

-Groups will present their menus and visual presentations to the class in order to see multiple varieties of healthy choices in food decisions.
-Students will continue writing in food journal.

Day Four:

-They will exchange menus with other groups and make a math problem from calorie information found on individual menus by writing down a complete and healthy meal choice. They must have items from all of food groups for the meal.
-They will use their calculators to add up the total calories in their chosen meal.
-Students will graph the total calories of a meal at each restaurant, extend graph to include an estimate calorie intake for a week of these meals.

Day Five:

-Students will suggest their own healthy ideas for their school lunch by sending a email to the principal
-Students calculate the number of calories they have consumed this week based on their food choices in their food journals.

Extension:

-Collect menus from local restaurants to see how healthy the meals are and tally the caloric information.
-Continue to encourage students to make healthy nutritious decisions with their diets.

Differentiated Instruction:
ESL:
Immersion within small groups allows ESL’s to participate side by side with standard native English speakers. Using Google Language tools to translate websites to native languages allows to bridge language barriers.

Challenge/Extend:
There is no stipulation as to how many menu items that a student must provide, they can make it as simple or as complex of a menu as needed. Students can design their menus to include separate appetizers, sides and desserts, or can have a simple ‘café’ style menu with ala carte items.
If time allows, see extension in procedures.

Special Needs:
Proper resources will be included in the classroom to accommodate students with their specific needs. Examples can include having special programs that allow students to adapt assignments. With special needs student, the classroom will be designed to incorporate and encourage diversity with all learners, based on class compositions, not just this lesson.