M & M cafe

Students will be divided into small groups and be required to come up with two balanced meals and one unbalanced meal using breakfast, lunch and dinner.

A lesson plan for grade 2 English Language Arts and Mathematics

By Barbara Money

Learn more

• Nutrition Cafe games about nutrition for students who finish early or for the class as a whole

Related pages

• Healthy foods = super kids: This lesson focuses on how the foods we eat affect our bodies in both beneficial and harmful ways. Students will learn that grains provide energy; vegetables are needed for healthy skin, hair and eyes; fruits help the body heal, milk builds strong bones and teeth; meat builds muscle and gives strength; and sweets, fats, and oils are high in calories and give few vitamins and minerals and do little to help our bodies grow.
• Food choice in our everyday lives: Focuses on everyday foods and how these foods relate to the food pyramid. Students will recognize food vocabulary in the target language (Spanish) and will make healthy food choices by creating thinking maps, a school menu in the target language, and exploring food choices from around the world.
• La comida y la salud: Focuses on food and health using the food pyramid in Spanish. Students consider food choices and share food likes and dislikes. This lesson should be used after introcing food vocabulary and me gusta.

Related topics

• Learn more about healthful living and nutrition.

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Learning outcomes

Students will:

• Use the knowledge gained from reading and discussing the five different food groups and make a balanced and unbalanced breakfast, lunch and dinner to show that they understand a balanced meal.
• Group M & M’s into food groups and graph the results.

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

90 minutes

Materials/resources

• food pyramid
• poster board or large sheets of drawing paper
• crayons
• markers
• pencils
• M & M’s
• graph paper

Technology resources

• overhead projector
• computer with internet access if web sites are used

Pre-activities

• Lessons on the five food groups, their importance in a healthy life, and examples of balanced and unbalanced meals.
• Instructions on reading and interpreting data and graphs.
• Instructions on making graphs.

Activities

1. Review the food pyramid and the five food groups.
2. Explain the project to the whole class: The students will come up with two balanced meals and one unbalanced meal in small groups using one breakfast, one lunch, and one dinner. The small groups will make pictures for their meals and these pictures will be presented to the class. Each meal will be made on a separate piece of paper and should be labeled breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Make sure that each group discusses their meals before they start drawing. They are to decide what to put into each meal and what meal will be unbalanced. Encourage the groups to make a “good unbalanced” meal. This will require some deep thinking and creativity. The groups will tell what food groups made up each meal.
3. Divide the class into five small groups consisting of four or five students. Assign one child to be captain. The captain will be responsible for seeing that the meals are discussed and that every child helps out with the preparations and drawings. A team member can be used to draw or present a meal. Teams should decide ahead of time who will be drawing and who will be presenting. Everyone should have a part.
4. Give each group three sheets of drawing paper or poster board and have group members get crayons, markers, and pencils. They are to draw large pictures for each meal and label them breakfast, lunch, or dinner.
5. The captain will be responsible for seeing that all three meals are completed and labeled. The captain will give the completed pictures of the meals to the students who will be presenting it to the class. Each group will go over their meals to make sure that they are presentable.
6. The teacher will call the groups back to their seats.
7. The teacher will explain the evaluation sheet to the whole class. Put a copy of the form on the overhead and do a sample to help the students understand how to mark it. Do this several times. Then pass out the evaluation sheet and direct students to put their name on it. Now students are ready to evaluate.
8. The teacher needs to give each group a number. One will be called Group One, one will be Group Two, and so on.
9. Each group will present their meals to the class. Students will mark their sheets after each meal is presented. Each meal needs to be repeated at least three times to give students a chance to figure out if it is balanced or unbalanced and to know which food groups are represented.
10. After every group has presented their meals, then the teacher will collect the evaluation sheets.
11. The teacher will then give each child a handful of M & M’s and discuss which food group they represent.
12. Students will then divide the M & M’s into food groups. Light brown will be grains, dark brown will be meats, yellow and green will be vegetables, red and orange will be fruits, and blues will be dairy.
13. Have the students graph their results. Use any graph paper or make your own graph.
14. Students will then eat their M & M’s.

Assessment

• Students will be assessed on how well they work in groups and how well they create their balanced and unbalanced meals.
• Students will individually score each group by putting a check next to each meal that is presented. Students will use the check off sheet provided by the teacher. If it is an unbalanced breakfast, then they will put a check next to unbalanced breakfast. If it is a balanced lunch, then they will put a check next to balanced lunch. They teacher will collect every child’s sheet and see if they correctly identified balanced and unbalanced meals.
• Using the more difficult form, the students can be assessed on their ability to list the food groups that are mentioned with each meal.
• Pass out M & M’s to each student and assess them on how well they sort them into food groups and how well they graph the results.

Supplemental information

Comments

We go to Harris Teeter (a local grocery store) as a follow up to our nutrition unit. Harris Teeter does a great tour and has a slogan “Five a Day is the Healthy Way.” The class gets to see the foods that belong to the different groups. They also get to sample foods from the different groups.