Reading and deciphering a food label is like learning a foreign language to many students! Some get it quickly and easily, some don’t and require more practice! Reading a new food label is an interactive lesson that has students cutting, pasting, and annotating various pieces of label information before learning how to decipher the numbers to determine its healthfulness. Once students understand the concept, their label reading skills can be reinforced by practicing on empty food containers!
Sharing another Struggle Meal lesson that I presented at the Missouri FACS conference last summer! This lesson titled, A Glo-Bowl Affair, is a fun, engaging lesson that was inspired by both Frankie Celenza’s Struggle Meal Grain Bowl episode and by activities suggested in the EduProtocol Field Guide (amazon affiliate). I hope your students find this lesson and all of its activities as enjoyable as mine did!
When teaching about whole grains, I like to cover the following six categories: wheat, oats, rye, rice, corn and barley. I do this as an overview because it’s a great way to introduce and expose students to a variety of whole grains that can be incorporated into different meals. After all, 100% whole grains are part of a healthy, nutritious diet!
When I begin teaching my unit on dating, I always begin by looking at idealistic, realistic and unrealistic relationships! This activity is used as a springboard into other dating and relationship topics and always generates some interesting discussion! It’s low prep and you can pick and choose from the below examples or do them all! Either way you’re sure to get some lively student responses!
As children, my siblings and I played outside everyday mostly because we loved it and wanted to, but sometimes because our parents insisted that it was too nice a day not to! I know, I know…it was a different time. But sadly, have you ever noticed how few children you actually see playing outdoors anymore? I decided to poll my students and see what their thoughts were on the subject and then take a hard look at why we need to bring nature & outdoor play back and get children engaged on a regular basis!
Looking for a fun, interactive and somewhat challenging activity when teaching about portions? I was! Since I love using breakouts, I created “Escape Portion Distortion” that can be done with the locks and boxes if you have them or digitally, using Google Forms if you don’t…win-win for everyone!
My son recently introduced me to “starter pack memes” which I had to look up! He had to create one for a college “get to know you” activity and once I knew what it was, I thought it would make a great, fun and interactive activity. So, below you will find my starter pack meme ideas for topics that can be used in a variety of different content areas along with instructions for creating.
You might wonder why I have so many lessons and/or activities for the same topic. The truth is I teach three different classes where I need to cover “food safety” before I let students go into the lab/kitchen. I don’t want to do the same thing in each of those classes because many of my students I see again for other electives, hence, the need for variety! Even if you don’t teach multiple courses like I do, you may just want to shake up your own lesson or add this Food Safety: Web-Activity & Review to your arsenal of resources for future use!
Ever need an activity that is easy to do, requires little prep and is totally adaptable to any class? The activity I’m sharing in this post is one of those and is super easy to leave with a sub if you know you’re going to be out. How do I know this? Because I used it in two different classes on different days and with different subs and the student outcomes were no less than impressive! The format is basically the same, you just have to change out your topic, hence the versatility!
What is it about cooking challenges that gets students so excited? In my Career & Consumer Sciences class, my students always want to know if we are going to cook! In order to prepare them for adulthood and living on their own, I do incorporate some survival cooking! I try to teach them basic skills, preparing foods or meals that have a lot of versatility or options! My students love chicken tenders and so this challenge was well received and gave them some different ways of preparing chicken tenders using the same four ingredients. Of course, you don’t have to limit this challenge to one specific class or age group as it would work well with junior high level students too because of it’s simplicity!
