What's That Shape?

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Use the poster's border images for an exercise on recognizing shapes. |
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Point to the different foods and invite children to name their shapes. You might also provide paper cutouts of circles, squares, triangles, rectangles, and ovals. Children can take turns matching a paper shape to a food of the same shape. |
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Expand the focus on foods with distinctive shapes. At snack and other meals, invite children to name the shapes they see in the foods they eat. |
What's That Grain?
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When you introduce Lots of Foods Come From Grains! - return to the border images and draw attention to the grain key in each square. Explain that each food is made from a kind of grain. Guide children in telling which foods come from wheat, rye, oats, rice, and corn. |
Sharing the Poster With Families
Display the Breakfast! poster where families can take note of its important message about breakfast and get ideas for morning menus from the variety, and especially the whole-grain foods, shown. Encourage families to continue the shape search by looking for breads, cereals, pasta, and rice products of different shapes as they shop together in the supermarket and eat together at home.
Come to the Happy Morning Café
Invite children to set up a breakfast restaurant in the dramatic-play area. They can help make menus using photographs of whole-grain foods and other healthful choices from home and cooking magazines. (Use the foods on the poster as ideas for menu choices. Be sure there are foods that reflect the cultures in your group.) Create meals to serve by pasting pictures of whole-grain foods, eggs, and so on, onto plain paper plates.
Place one or two small tables and chairs in the area. Invite children to help make a sign featuring the restaurant name (such as the Happy Morning Café
or a name they prefer). Children can take turns being customers ordering breakfast and waiters who take their orders and serve them.
As you observe their play, note the choices children make. Now and then, ask "customers" about their breakfast choices or point out that a whole-grain food, like whole-wheat toast, offers extra nutrients for extra goodness.
My Favorite Breakfast Invite children to use art materials to show their favorite breakfast. Let children approach this project in the way they choose. A child might create a painting or drawing, cut out pictures of foods to paste on a large sheet of paper, or use clay to make the form of a favorite food. Ask each to tell something about the creation, such as what foods are depicted or what the child likes breakfast. Write down the comments as a caption for the work.
Invite volunteers to describe their creations, and reinforce the importance of starting the day with foods that will give children energy to work and play. Then set up a Breakfast Gallery where children can display their art and descriptions. Encourage families to visit the gallery.
Breakfast Is for Going and Growing! Give each child a copy of the coloring book - Breakfast is for Going and Growing! Help each put it together as a story. Read the words and talk about the pictures. The story identifies the many activities that breakfast gives children (and adults) the energy to do, and the long-term benefits of healthful breakfasts in helping children grow. Invite them to color the pages and take the books home to share with their families.
Lots of Foods Come From Grains!
Display Lots of Foods Come From Grains! to introduce the concept that many foods children eat - specifically breads, cereals, pasta, and rice - come from plants called grains. Talk about the pictures on the card. Most children will recognize corn. For the others, encourage them to describe what they see. Then identify the pictures as wheat, rye, oats, rice, and corn. (Note that these are not the only grains. Another is barley.)
Read the captions. Invite children to name foods that come from each grain. Provide examples of each grain, if possible, and its processed form. For example, have samples of whole-wheat and rye flour, oatmeal, brown rice, and cornmeal or grits. Listen for children's questions. Use the resource that follow to help explain how grains are harvested and processed, including being made into flour or meal, and the different foods that come from grains.
A Whole Grain a Day…
Try a different category of grain foods at snack time or as a special tasting activity for each of several days (or on the timetable you choose). Check the bulleted list below for suggestions.
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Crackers - Whole wheat, rye, multigrain |
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Breads - Whole wheat, rye, multigrain |
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Dry cereals - (low sugar) Whole grain, rice, corn, oats |
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Muffins - Corn, oat, bran |
Whole-Grain Toasty Shape Snacks Here's an activity that blends this section's focus on whole-grain foods and shapes. Provide whole-grain breads, such as whole wheat, rye, multigrain, and oat bread, to encourage children to try these more nutritious varieties.
Review the five pictures on the Whole-Grain Toasty Shape Snacks. Explain that each shows a step in making a snack for children and one they can share with feathered friends, too.
Set up the toaster. Set out the slices of bread, spreads, plastic knives, cookie cutters, and plates and napkins.
Have children wash their hands. Then guide children as they take turns making their own snack. Carefully supervise use of the toaster. Let children choose a cookie cutter to give their toast snack a specific shape. (Ask each child to name the shape.) Assist children as needed in adding a spread of their choice on the toast shape. (If any children in your group are allergic to peanuts, eliminate peanut butter as an option for everyone.) Finally, provide a container where children can deposit the toast crusts for the birds.
Repeat this snack with different types of bread and choices of spreads. Offer cookie cutters to match different seasons and holidays.
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