Here's a range of activities, each divided into less/more time and complexity: Everyday learning, Keep active, Finding out and exploring, Worksheet activities, Interactive games and quizzes, Cooking, Being creative, Activities to do over a few days and Something to do together.
Everyday learning
Less time / Less complex
1. Numeracy: Use the Counting worksheet to learn about counting food. List three foods that you have in your house. Ask your parent/carer to help you look for these in your kitchen and count how many you have.
2. Team work: Play the Get ready to cook game with your family. Print the game, cut out the arrow and attach to the middle of the game using a split pin. Each player will need a copy of the Get ready to cook tick list. The aim is for the players to help Alisha or Ronnie by collecting all the getting ready to cook steps. Take turns to spin the arrow, if it lands on a getting ready to cook step, e.g. washing hands, tick/colour this on the tick sheet. The first person to tick off all the stages, wins.
3. Numeracy and cooking: Open a bag of carrots. How much do your carrots weigh? Which is the heaviest carrot? Which carrot makes the longest sticks/batons? Serve your carrot sticks with one of these delicious dips.
More time / More complex
4. Memory retrieval: Find 10 different food, drink or related items, e.g. a can of chopped tomatoes, a jar of mustard, an apple, a banana, a wooden spoon, a mug, a bag of pasta, a jar of mixed herbs, a can opener and a small saucepan. Place them on a tray, or on a table, and cover with a tea towel. Remove the cover for 20 seconds and challenge those you live with to remember as many items as they can. For a bonus point, ask them to say what they would be used for or suggest a recipe that could be made from them, e.g. pasta and tomato sauce using the can opener, saucepan and wooden spoon!
5. Literacy and cooking: Have a look in your freezer. Make a list of what you have and suggest three meals you could make. Write a recipe using the My recipe template worksheet and make the dish.
6. Shake away! Make your own butter. Pour 125ml double cream into a small container or jar with a screw top lid. Shake vigorously until you can hear that the butter has ‘split’. To check that this has happened, open the container/jar and see if a lump of butter has formed and the buttermilk has separated from it. Drain the buttermilk and use to make scones. At this point you could add garlic, herbs or spices to the butter. Chill in a refrigerator until needed.
Keep active
Less time / Less complex
1. Record what you do! Keep an activity diary of what you do each day! You could create an activity clock or a booklet to keep a record!
2. Have fun with Disney: Get active with Toy Story and make an activity dice featuring your favourite characters! Or why not join Dash, from The Incredibles, and get through the maze! (Note: originally designed for use in the classroom.)
3. Skip, hula and jump! Set up three activity stations – where you skip, hula and jump! No hula hoop, no problem – just wiggle!
More time / More complex
4. Energy in, energy out: Look at the amount of energy used to perform different activities – click here. For each activity, give 2-3 examples of different food and drinks that would provide the energy used – use Explore Food to find out!
5. Drink plenty! Create a poster, presentation or video explaining why it’s important to keep well hydrated when being active. Here’s some support!
6. Active lifestyles: Keep an activity journal! Answer the questions and keep a diary. If you don’t have a printer, copy the tasks onto paper.
Finding out and exploring
Less time / Less complex
1. Geography: “Why is the mushroom always invited to parties?” “Because he is a fun guy!” (fungi). Watch the video to investigate how mushrooms get from farm to fork. Finished already? Find out the names of 5 different mushrooms.
2. Food, nutrition and literacy: The Eatwell Guide recommends that we eat two portions of fish a week, one of which should be oily. Find out the names of three white fish and three oily fish. Explain the differences between them. For more information about fish in our diet, watch this Eatwell Guide video.
3. Geography: Traditional British meals have ancient origins, such as roasted and stewed meats and meat pies. However, traditions change with time – what would you consider to be a traditional British dish today? Use this poster to find out more about Food provenance on your doorstep and research food that is traditional to your local area.
More time / More complex
4. Science: Natural food colourings are used in many foods. In Europe these ingredients would have an E number which shows that the added ingredient is safe to use. Find out the main source and colour of these five natural food colourings: E100, E160c, E162, E163, E175. More information about food additives can be found here.
5. History and cooking: Some food may be a little difficult to get at the moment, but food shortages are not new to some older people. Find out about food availability during World War II and answer the questions. You could make a Woolton Pie, named after the Minister of Food.
6. Food and literacy: Not everyone likes the same food. The taste, odour, appearance, shape and colour of food can affect people in different ways. Download and print a selection of Food cards, UK food cards, or World food cards or show them on a screen. Ask your family if they like or dislike the ingredient or food. Ask them to explain what it is that they particularly like or dislike about it.
Worksheet activities
Less time / Less complex
1. Numeracy and art: Make your own jigsaw. Draw a picture of your favourite meal and cut it into pieces. Challenge a member of your family to put it back together! You could use the Eatwell Guide jigsaw as an example.
2. Literacy, art and safety: Watch these videos which show different food skills, such as peeling and grating. Complete the Using equipment worksheet. Draw hands using the equipment and the food being prepared. Highlight safety considerations.
3. Literacy and food hygiene: Food – fact of life’s kitchen is a mess! Spot the hazards and write a list of ten top tips that Food – a fact of life should follow to prevent, or reduce the risk, of an accident or food poisoning.
More time / More complex
4. Numeracy and art: Build a pizza! Roll the dice to collect all the ingredients for your pizza. Tick each one you collect and then draw your pizza. Use an English muffin cut in half, or a crumpet, for the base and make your pizza.
5. Literacy: Choose a recipe you have recently made. Create a food label using the Blank packaging net. Ensure that the label includes the information required by law that relates to food hygiene and safety, e.g. a date mark, ingredient list (with allergens identified) and storage instructions. Find out more about food labelling here.
6. Literacy and numeracy: All around the world, people choose to eat different food for many different reasons. One very important factor for most people is the cost of the food. Making informed choices helps us achieve a balanced and varied diet. Watch the Economy of food presentation to find out more about food choice and cooking on a budget. Complete the Working to a budget activity to calculate the cost of a recipe and suggest ways this could be reduced.
Interactive games and quizzes
Less time / Less complex
1. Health and wellbeing: How well are you sleeping? Check out our sleep well resources and complete the My sleep diary to keep track of how well you’ve been sleeping.
2. Science and nutrition: How well do you know your vitamins from your minerals? Try our new interactive matching activity to test your knowledge of what foods provide different micronutrients.
3. Nutrition and memory retrieval: Test your family’s knowledge on sport nutrition with our interactive quiz! Get each family member to bring a laptop, smart phone or tablet and play the interactive Kahoo!t quiz together. Have a look at the Kahoot! user guide before you start. If you would rather work on these quizzes alone, try out our quiz worksheets, or our interactive quizzes if you are wanting to do more together.
More time / More complex
4. Food and nutrition: Make a tasty burger with the Gourmet Burger Builder! Use the Be creative worksheet to plan recipes using four ingredients that you could add to a burger (burger mix, bread or toppings) from each culture or cuisine shown.
5. ICT and cooking: Calculate the nutritional composition of your lockdown lunch with Explore Food. Work through the case studies to understand the dietary needs of different people.
6. Activity and memory retrieval: How much do you know about getting active? Test your knowledge with our online, self-marking, multiple choice quizzes here. Passing a quiz will also award you with a printable certificate!
Cooking
This time we are going to focus on food skills. Why not develop, demonstrate and perfect your food skills with the recipes below?
Weighing and measuring: Awesome overnight oats
Mixing: Marvellous mackerel pâté
Sniping, grating and slicing: Perfect plant salad (coleslaw)
Forming and shaping: Spicy potato Scotch eggs
Rubbing-in and rolling-out: Quiche
Stir-frying: Chili ginger beef
More recipe ideas can be found here.
Being creative
Less time / Less complex
1. Literacy and art: Read the story about The colourful present in which Alisha helps Ronnie put together a colourful fruit and vegetable basket for his Grandma’s birthday. Think about the special people in your life (family, friends, carers). What makes them special to you? Use the Colourful present worksheet to design a gift for a special person in your life at the moment.
2. Feed the birds too! Find an empty drinks carton or plastic milk bottle that would otherwise be recycled. Ask an adult, if necessary, to cut a hole in one of the sides. Decorate if you would like to. Tie string around the carton, or bottle, top and fill with bird seeds. Hang from a tree or a balcony or place on a window sill.
3. Art: Draw around your hand - and then create a 5 A DAY poster to encourage those that live with you to eat a variety of fruit and vegetables each day.
More time / More complex
4. Treat someone: Invite someone in your house for dinner. Create an invitation for them, decide what to serve and design a fancy menu. Cook and enjoy the meal together.
5. Music: Write a song around healthy eating based on the tune of Frère Jacques. Remember that Frère Jacques can be sung as a round, so why not ask your family to join in? Here is a verse to start you off:
Healthy eating
Healthy eating
Is good for you
Is good for you
Fruit and veg has fibre
Fruit and veg has fibre
Yes, they do!
Yes, they do!
6. Cooking and art: Create a garnish using fruit or vegetables, for example a cucumber twist, tomato rose, strawberry fan, lemon basket or spring onion curl. Look online for images or videos that you could follow. Use what you have created to garnish a meal.
Activities to do over a few days or a week
Eating 5 A DAY
Vegetables and fruit provide a range of vitamins and minerals needed for health. It is important to eat a wide variety of vegetables and fruit, as each type provides different amounts and combinations of nutrients. Over a week, why not challenge yourself and your family to eat your 5 A DAY? Use the My 5 A DAY tally chart to record the vegetables and fruit you are eating. For a super challenge, you could try and eat five different vegetables and fruit each day. Complete the Strive for 25 chart to show how you are doing each day. More information about the importance of eating vegetables and fruit can be found here.
Nutritional analysis
Watch the Nutritional analysis – why and how presentation to find out why nutritional analysis is important. Then, work through the recipe worksheets, diet worksheets and also the case studies.
Something to do together
What have you been having for lunch? Write down the lunch you have had for the last two days. Ask your parent/carer to read through the lunchbox information. Write down some healthy changes you could make to your lunch. Use the Healthy lunchbox builder to plan lunch for you and your parent/carer for tomorrow! As an extra challenge, why not use Explore food to carry out a nutritional analysis of the lunch you plan?
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