Food Week October 2008

Watch the video below and read the explanation to find out what Food Week was all about!

Video length: 2 min 22 secs

Soundtrack: Hobbayne children singing during Harvest Festival Assembly 10th October 2008

Why have a food week?

The aim of Food Week was to inspire and enthuse the children about food.  We wanted to:

• teach them what constitutes a healthy diet
• to enable them to make reasoned choices about their own diets as they grow up.
• to handle, smell and taste both common and more exotic foods.
• to have fun in the process!

Food Week Activities

The week began with cookery sessions for Years 4, 5 and 6 with Kays Cookery.  Each year from Reception to Year 6 completed written activities about healthy eating and making informed choices about the food we buy as well as a range of practical activities where they played games or took part in group work to increase their knowledge and understanding of many of the foods we eat.  At lessons this week took on the food theme too.

Nursery and Reception

Children enjoyed playing food games such as the Greedy Gorilla, Tummy Ache and The Lunch Box Game which helped them to think about what foods are good to eat and which are not so good.  They also enjoyed stories about The Giant Jam Sandwich and The Little Red Hen Makes Pizza, and had fun with giant puzzles of The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Years 1 and 2 - Where do I Grow?

We presented the children with a list of common fruit and vegetables and asked them to say where each one grew - either in the ground, above the ground or in a tree.  They then had to identify each item on the list from a huge basket of fresh fruit and vegetables and we discussed whether the children had eaten them before, what climate they grew in, whether you could eat them raw or how they might be cooked.

Years 3 and 5 - Tales from the Sea - Vitamin C

Six pupils from each class performed a short play to their classmates about the discovery that eating fruit containing Vitamin C could prevent scurvy amongst sailors at sea, and how this saved hundreds of sailors from a horrible death!  The children also took part in a quiz to discover what other foods contained Vitamin C and helped put together a Vitamin C-rich packed lunch.

Year 4 - Snakes and Ladders

The children played snakes and ladders, but with a food theme, and had to answer all sorts of questions about fruit and vegetables, what constitutes a healthy diet and how to look after their teeth.

Year 6 - Weird and Wonderful

We gave the children baskets containing six different sets of ingredients and asked them what they thought they would make - foods that they had all eaten many times before but probably had never considered what they were made of, such as bread, baked beans and vanilla ice cream.  Then we presented them with a variety of more unusual fruits and vegetables and asked them to identify as many as they could.  We then discussed the answers and the children had the chance to sample some of the more exotic fruits, such as avacados, melons, pomegranates, dragon fruit and limes - the limes proved very popular!

Friday 10th October

In the afternoon, the children from Years 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6 developed their culinary skills by making some delicious snacks for people to sample at the Food Week exhibition:

Year 1 - Cheese and Cucumber sandwiches on wholemeal bread

Year 2 - Houmous and Carrot wraps

Year 3 - Mini Fruit Kebabs

Year 4 - Fruit'n'Nut Flapjacks

Year 6 - Freshly Squeezed Orange Juice

Reception children also chooped fruit on Thursday afternoon to make fruit salad which they ate in class!

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