Programme Examples

Introduction to the topic, and group discussion on what we need to be healthy. Then we discuss unhealthy choices. Look at magazines, and make collages of healthy living – exercise/ fruit & vegetables/ playing outside/being with friends/ getting enough sleep etc. and collages of unhealthy habits such as too much fast food, smoking, drinking to excess, gaming until late at night etc. Recap and end session.

Recap on week 1. Healthy food choices, so this week we look at the children’s weekly diet, what they like to eat/ dislike. We then choose a meal to make using fresh ingredients for the following week. The activity this week is to expand the children’s tastes, we play a game of Blind Food Tasting, children are blindfolded and have to guess different foods- we try to introduce them to new fruits, vegetables, things like humus, yogurts, sauces , crackers etc. we mix flavours and textures. It’s fun and the children also get to feed the adults too!

Food and Exercise. Cook healthy dinner from scratch, and discuss healthy options for lunches and dinners. Look at the Food Pyramid and what the different food groups are, what we need for energy, calcium etc. Healthy swaps for example swap crisps to popcorn. Fruits juice to water. Then we do a fun exercise activity, such as dance , basketball or drama games.

Hand Hygiene. How to wash your hands, why we need to wash our hands. We make posters for the Project about hand washing. Show the children how germs spread by using the paint touch experiment i.e. put green paint on a child’s hand and let them walk around the room, the paint represents the germs on his hand, and shows how our hands touch door handles, then we might touch our face, open a press etc.

Oral hygiene. How to brush our teeth properly. The local Dental Nurse usually gives us a short talk on hidden food sugars and oral hygiene. Children get a toothbrush and toothpaste at end of the session.

Hair Hygiene. What are head lice, how to treat them, tying our hair back, make posters on nit busters. We then recap the 6 weeks, evaluate the programme with the children, what parts they liked/ disliked. All children receive a wash bag with shampoo, conditioner, brush, deodorant etc.