Lesson Overview

This lesson helps young people understand how choosing healthful snacks is a habit that can benefit them every day as they grow. The youth will discuss their snacking habits and make a plan to switch out unhealthful snacks with healthful ones.

Instructor Notes

Before facilitating this lesson, you may want to review the following information about snacking. These facts can be shared with young people during your discussions.

• Snacks are foods we eat between meals to satisfy hunger and supply us with consistent energy. To lots of kids and teens, a snack is a bag of chips, some cookies or other high calorie, low nutrient food. Kids are eating more snacks than ever and their calorie intake from those snacks has nearly doubled over the last 30 years. Unfortunately, the extra snacking has contributed to individuals becoming overweight in our society.
• Does that mean snacking is bad for kids? Definitely not! Snacking can help them stay focused at school and while doing homework, and give them a nutritious boost for the day.
• When we think of healthful snack choices we should look to the five food groups (vegetables, fruits, grains, dairy and protein).
• Healthful snacks are ones that fit into the five food groups. For example, string cheese (dairy) and carrot sticks (vegetable). Potato chips may start out as a healthful vegetable but after processing, it becomes high in calories, fat and sodium.

Activity: Snacking Habits

1. Ask the youth: What is a habit? A habit is something you do often or regularly, without even thinking about it.
2. Ask young people to name some habits and write their answers on the board. Habits might include brushing teeth, cracking knuckles, biting nails, smoking or exercise.
3. Ask young people to circle the habits that are good for you. Are there more unhealthful habits listed than healthful ones? Why? Possible answers might be:
   • easier to do unhealthful habits
   • harder to do healthful ones
   • healthful ones might need reminding or support from family or friends.
4. Have each young person take out a piece of paper and pencil and ask them to write down up to five things that they eat on a regular basis for snacks. Give the youth time to write their answers. Invite young people to share what they wrote.
5. Ask the youth, why do we eat snacks? When do we eat snacks? Can the snack choices you make over and over become a habit? How do you know if your snack choice is a healthful habit for you or one that is not healthful? Give them a few minutes to brainstorm and share their answers. Explain how foods that fall into the five food groups are healthful snacks and ones that we should choose regularly over unhealthful snacks.
6. Ask young people to share what might be some consequences (results) of making unhealthful snack choices a habit over time. Possible answers might be:
   • extra weight
   • blocked arteries
   • heart disease
   • cancer
   • being tired.
7. Open the Online Interactive Lesson and Activity. This helps you review the benefits of healthy snacking and gives examples of many snack foods from the five food groups. Young people can choose snacks from the food groups to build their own creative snack idea.
8. Have the youth to create an action plan for choosing healthful snacks instead of unhealthful snacks on the My Pledge to Eat Right and Move More worksheet.

Conclusion

Ask the young people to identify someone (friend, family member, or teacher) to help support or remind them of their action plan to change their snacking habit.

Continuing the Conversation

Hand out the Healthy Families Newsletter in English or Spanish, so that families can work together to plan smart snacks at home.

Related Health Powered Kids Blog(s)

Additional Instructor Resources

Are You a Smart Snacker? – (Russian) – (Somali) – (Spanish)
There Are Sneaky Sugars! – (Russian) – (Somali) – (Spanish)
What Kind of Sugar is in Your Food?  – (Russian) – (Somali) – (Spanish)
Check the Nutrition Facts Label! – (Russian) – (Somali) – (Spanish)

Lesson Overview

Introduction: Food Safety Story

Without introducing the topic of food poisoning, tell the young people that there is a mystery you need them to solve. Distribute copies of Food Safety Story. Have the youth work in small groups to read through it and identify the reasons they think the catastrophe might have happened. After a while debrief as a group, perhaps asking each group to share one idea, one at a time, until all ideas have been shared. Write their ideas on a flipchart or whiteboard. Then introduce the topic of food safety, assuring young people that you will come back to the story at the end of the lesson.

Activity: Learning about Causes and Consequences of Food Poisoning

Introduce food poisoning by explaining that it is an illness that can happen when we eat foods that have harmful bacteria, viruses and parasites or their toxins. The effects can range from barely noticeable to extremely unpleasant.

1. Ask the young people if they know what symptoms these harmful germs may cause.

Symptoms of food poison may include:

• upset stomach

• nausea

• vomiting

• diarrhea

• fever

Tell the youth that mild cases of food poisoning are actually common and we may not even know we have it because we think it is just a stomach flu or virus. We can’t get rid of all bacteria and some bacteria can even be good for us. There are many things we can do, however, to prevent us from getting sick from the foods we eat.

2. Most of the germs that can cause food poisoning (also known as food borne illness) come from animals, such as meat, eggs, milk, shellfish, or unwashed produced. Raw or undercooked foods are also more likely to cause food poisoning because the process of thoroughly cooking often kills unhealthy germs. Sometimes the germs are transferred from work surfaces or hands that haven’t be properly cleaned after touching contaminated food. So cleanliness and proper cooking are two of the most important ways to prevent it.

3. Ask how many help their families cook at home. What kind of things do you or your family members do to keep things clean while cooking?  Make sure the following are mentioned:

• Wash your hands before and after handling food.

• Don’t use the same cutting board you use for raw meats. It needs to be thoroughly cleaned and sanitized after each use.

• Wash counters and food preparation areas with soap and water before cooking.

• Wash fruits and vegetables before eating. For example, was the outside of melon before cutting into it.

4. Imagine that you are looking in the refrigerator for a snack. What kind of things do you do to make sure food is safe before eating it?

• Only eat foods that are cooked right – if it doesn’t look done, don’t eat it.

• If a food smells or looks different than it normally would, the food might be spoiled and you shouldn’t eat or drink it.

• Keep leftovers only 3 to 4 days in the fridge and heat them up well before eating.

• Check expiration dates and use the food before it expires. Don’t eat if it is after the expiration date.

• Germs grow best at room temperature, so cover and refrigerate food right away to keep the bacteria from growing out of control.

 Activity: Myth or Fact?

Introduce the Myth or Fact quiz explaining that it focuses on ways we can keep our food safe. Use the interactive whiteboard lesson or the worksheet located in the What You Need section above. Have the youth work in small groups or as a large group to complete the activity and see how “food safety savvy” they are.

Conclusion

Now that you have learned more about the potential causes of food poisoning, ask the youth to revisit the list of things they think could have caused the illness in the half of Ms. Carey’s class. Be sure to include the following:

• Preparing raw meat (the turkeys) in the same place as the sandwiches were being made could have contaminated the sandwiches.

• The tuna sandwiches might have contained mayonnaise and both tuna and mayonnaise need to be kept chilled.

• Suzy’s apples weren’t washed.

• Tou’s salad may have gone bad even though it smelled okay.

• Victor’s chicken may have been undercooked since he rushed it.

Answer to the activity: Students may not have cleaned their hands after visiting the petting farm.

Continuing the Conversation

Hand out the Healthy Families Newsletter in English or Spanish, which also includes these tips, so that families can continue discussing food safety at home.

Related Health Powered Kids Blog

Keeping your food safe

Additional Instructor Resources

• USDA Food Safety Education
• USDA Food Safety Tips
• USDA Food Safety Advice

Lesson Overview

This lesson helps young people understand the importance of accurately estimating how much of a food they should eat. The youth will estimate portion sizes of snacks and compare to the actual serving size. To make estimating easier, they will compare portion sizes to common items.

Introduction

To introduce this topic, share the following information with the youth. If desired, you can reference the Nutrition Facts label on this handout.

• Average portion sizes of food and beverages in America have significantly increased over the past 20 years. Often the portion size of food and/or drink we have is enough for two or three people. This increase in portion size is changing what we think of as a “normal” portion.
• A portion is the amount of food that you choose to eat for a meal or snack.
• A serving is a measured amount of food or drink, such as one slice of bread or 1 cup (eight ounces) of milk.
• Many foods that come as a single portion actually have multiple servings. The Nutrition Facts label on packaged foods—found on the backs of cans, sides of boxes, etc. — tells you the number of servings in the container.
• It is important for young people to understand that this distortion of portion sizes is causing us to think we can eat more of certain foods than our bodies truly need which can lead to being overweight or obese and an increased risk for chronic (long-lasting) disease.

Activity: What’s your portion size?

For this activity you will need a full bag of chips or box of snack crackers and two paper plates.

Any young person or instructor handling food should wash their hands prior to handling the food.

1. On one plate, ask a volunteer to pour out the amount of snack they think one serving would be.
2. Next, have him or her look at the Nutrition Facts label on the package. It tells you how many servings are in the package and what amount equals one serving size. Have the volunteer take out one serving size and put it on the other plate next to the plate with the serving size he or she thought might be one serving.
3. Ask the youth to compare the two, and let them share their thoughts about it.
4. What happens if we are always eating portions that are more than one serving and we start to think that a bigger portion of food is “normal?” Give the group time to answer. If we eat portions on a regular basis that are larger than our body requires we may gain excess weight or become unhealthy.
5. Give a few examples of portion distortion:
   • A single serving of pretzels is 10 pieces, however many people will eat twice as many without realizing they’re eating a double portion.
   • Many brand name cereals list a portion as ¾ or 1 cup. If you were to pour out ¾ cup of cereal it would look rather small, especially if you use a typical cereal bowl.

Understanding portion sizes is an important component to maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

Activity: Estimating Accurate Portions

1. Show young people the Portion Distortion Slides/Quiz-Interactive Web Application.
2. Ask them, what are some ways we can keep our portions within a single serving size? Possible answers might be:
   • Don’t eat snacks like chips or cookies right from the bag. Instead, put one serving size on our plate, close the bag, and put it away.
   • Look at the Nutrition Facts labels on foods more often so we know the actual serving size.
3. Review the importance of understanding what is an acceptable portion size of the food they are eating.

Serving sizes are listed on the labels of most foods, so use the Nutrition Facts label to decide the amount that is right for you. For foods that don’t have a label, common items can be your guide to help you decide the right portion.

• Deck of cards = 3 ounce serving of meat/protein
• Tennis ball = serving of fruit or 1/2 cup ice cream
• Fist = 1 cup serving vegetables and grains
• Tip of thumb = dressings, butter or cream cheese
• 4 dice = 1 ounce of cheese

If time permits, use the ChooseMyPlate.gov Food Gallery to come up with your own comparison of portion size to common objects.

• • Vegetables
  • Grains
  • Protein Foods
  • Fruits
  • Dairy

Conclusion

Have young people write down the most surprising thing they learned about portion sizes today and post it on a visible area in the classroom or take home to post on their refrigerator.

 Continuing the Conversation

Hand out the Healthy Families Newsletter in English or Spanish, so that young people can continue discussing healthy portion sizes with their families at home.

Related Health Powered Kids Blog

Portion sizes: What amount is ‘right’?

Additional Instructor Resources:

• Allina Health Portion Size Guide
• Managing Portion Sizes: Meals and Snacks video
• Check the Nutrition Facts Label! – (Russian) – (Somali) – (Spanish)
• Serving Sizes and Portions