Label it!

• Food Cards (main meals only)*
• real food packaging for labels and print example labels that appear on the worksheet
• make red/amber/green voting cards
• FSS Cookin Castle interactive game

*Food cards can be ordered from FSS

Warm up

• sort packaging by salt, sugar, fat and calorie content:
  • with values covered up to explore initial perceptions of food
  • with values revealed
• discussion of results

From teacher resources talk about:

• why some values are red/amber/green
• daily recommended allowance
• how this is calculated
• why this is important

Creating graphs and charts

• create graphs and pie-charts using the information on the front of packs, e.g. by comparing the calories, fat, saturated fat, sugar, salt against different products
• visually represent front of pack information in a different way for comparison

Games-based activities

• guess the colour for each category on a range of packaging (hold up main meals in food cards and teacher has examples of a nutritional label for each of them as an answer)
• pupils have Red/Amber/Green cards to hold up/vote with when each category is shown
• values and colours are revealed
• discuss differences and healthy options

Play Your Cards Right

• a game like the old T.V. show
• uses examples from food packaging rather than playing cards
• class needs to vote higher or lower for each category of content – e.g. compare 2 cards for one nutrient

Find the healthiest food

• show a range of packaged food using physical examples
• pupils need to identify the most/least healthy foods and explain why

Cookin Castle

• play Cookin Castle 'in the kitchen' game to create a day or week of healthy meals - look up front of pack information on supermarket websites to analyse meals cooked

Observations

Photographs as evidence

Guess the colour games

Consider CfE Benchmarks, for example:

• uses different food labelling system to select foods for a specified dietary requirement for example, low in fat
• evaluates information on food packaging and uses it to make informed choices when selecting food for given situations

Literacy – listening and talking

Literacy – write about what makes a food healthy

Maths -percentages and charts

ICT

Support

• mixed ability groups
• Pre-prepared Top Trumps
• focus on one category eg. Sugar at a time.
• remove numbers and use colours or another visual representation eg. spoons of sugar.

Challenge

• design your own system of denoting nutritional content of packaged food
• design your own food label Top Trumps
• introduce portion size, frequency of eating and recommended daily allowance
• plan a healthy eating plan or class party