Activity Purpose
Help kids identify nutritious food choices give them the best energy to move and play.
Objectives
- Identify "food" as fuel for your body and brain.
- Use a stoplight as a tool to make nutritional food and beverage choices: green-light (eat more), yellow-light (eat some), and red-light (eat less).
- Recognize that green-light foods provide the most nutrition to fuel your body for energy to be active.
Preparation
- Talk Time: Kids sit and stretch or stand and march in place. Be sure they are a safe distance (arm’s length) apart.
- Activity: Divide kids into groups of 3 to 4. Have Move Activity Cards and Food Activity Cards ready. See diagram for activity area set-up. The color of the food word's text indicates whether the food is a green-light food, yellow-light food, or a red-light food.
- Wrap Up: Kids sit in a circle for discussion.
Talk Time
Introduction
Pretend you are making your favorite food. Are you rolling out the dough for pizza, growing tall like a banana, or getting wiggly like spaghetti?
Let's talk about some important things to know about how food and move are connected:
- Just like a car, your body needs fuel for you to move throughout your day.
- Fuel your body with fit foods to have energy to move.
- Make green-light food and beverage choices to fuel and hydrate your body. Choose water or milk!
This activity is like a relay and will help you learn more about how food gives you energy to move.
Do The Activity
Activity Instructions
- Divide the kids into small groups (3-4 kids per group).
- Assign each group a starting position. (see diagram)
- The first kid runs along the outside of the activity area to a cone and grabs a Move Activity Card.
- Next, they run to the center of the activity area to grab a Food Activity Card, then run back to the group.
- Once the kid is back with the group, all teammates look at the food card to determine what speed to do the move from the move card.
- Green-light foods: move at high speed
- Yellow-light foods: move at a normal speed
- Red-light foods: move in slow motion
- Complete the move for the indicated amount of time or repetitions.
- The next kid in line runs to get a Move Activity Card and a Food Activity Card.
- Continue this process until all move cards have been collected.
- Each group adds up the points for their food cards.
- Red-light foods = 1
- Yellow-light foods = 2
- Green-light foods = 3
- Move Activity Card= 3
- If time allows, repeat the activity and switch up the groups by rotating the first kid of each group to the end of the line of the group on the right.
- Once activity is completed, kids will form a circle and march in place for the Wrap Up.
Wrap Up
Reflections
Q: You just woke up and have an extra busy day ahead of you. What's a good choice to fuel your body?
A: Any green-light food is a great choice. It doesn't have to be a "breakfast" food.
Challenge
Plan it! What will you fuel up with first thing tomorrow morning?
Time: 10 Minutes
What You'll Need
Resources
- fitClub Leader's Guide - Printable
- fitClub Move Activity Cards - Printable
- fitClub Food Activity Cards - Printable
Materials
- Music
- Timer
Helpful Tips
- If using a smaller space, choose different motor skills to do across the activity space such as bear crawl, crab walk, and inchworm.
- Modify the activity with basketballs and basketball hoops:
- Dribble the ball to a cone and shoot from that cone.
- Once the player makes a shot, grab a Move Activity Card from under the cone.
- If, after 3 attempts, a shot is not made, pick up a Move Activity Card from under the cone.
- Dribble the ball to the middle of the activity space and pick up a Food Activity Card.
- Continue to dribble the ball and make your way back to your group with your Move and Food Activity Cards.
- Continue the activity as described.