Happy Feet, Healthy Food Kids' Club

HAPPY FEET, HEALTHY FOOD KIDS' CLUB
Autumn Session 3
girl

At Arm's' Length
All photos on this page courtesy of Wesley Eaton

boy

Listening to the teacher

It was "Indian Summer" - the perfect time to stay outdoors and play as much as possible. When the children arrived, they made their nametags, picked up their folders, used a leaf stencil to trace a leaf, and chose a red, white, blue, black, or green tie. They were all curious as to what the ties were for, but my answer was, "We are going to play a game. You'll have to wait and see."

OUR LESSON
"Training your Dog" was the topic of the day. The children have been enjoying reading the FUN FEET section of their HAPPY FEET, HEALTHY FOOD books aloud. pounce

I chose our reader of the day and he read, "Teach your dog to walk on a leash." All the children in the class then read the same sentence in unison.

Then he read, "Teach your dog to fetch," and the class read it, too.

Then, "Teach your dog to sit and stay."

And "Teach your dog to run by your side."

The children thought of examples of other dog tricks:
-play dead
-roll over
-jump over the rock
-give me your paw
-get the newspaper

Later, on returning to the classroom, the children would draw a "dog trick" in the WRITER & ARTIST'S CORNER of their books.

OUR ACTIVITY
We walked out to the field and spread out at arm's length.

Today we would play a game which was a variation of last week's "Cheetahs, Deer, and Elephants". We added the categories of "skipping children" and "galloping horses". This week the children would have to stay attune into both colors and categories.

Here's how we played:

Using premade cards, I called off a color (to correspond to ties chidren wore around their wrists) and an animal. The children with the color tie then moved across the field following the animal code.

Examples:
WHITE - Cheetahs (Children wearing white ties ran fast across the field and jogged back.)
RED - Children (Children wearing red ties skipped across the field and jogged back.)
BLACK - Deer (Children wearing black ties jogged across the field and jogged back.)
cheetah

BLUE - Elephants (Children wearing blue ties speedwalked across the field and jogged back.)
GREEN - Horses (Children wearing green ties galloped across the field and jogged back.)

We played this way, until all of the children locomoted like each of the animals. We were then off on our nature walk.

BACK IN THE CLASSROOM
It's always a challenge to return to the classroom and finish all of our work before the parents arrive. Today the children had to color in their leaf to show their record of nature, draw 2 footprints to represent approximately a mile of exercise, fill in their journal section, their time tracker, healthy food 9-square, and creative section (with a drawing of their dog trick).

The children always go directly to their seats and we pass our prepoured water in small paper cups. They drink it all and if they want more, they get up and go to the water fountain.

For the journal entry, I put a few examples on the board.

We ran like cheetahs.
We galloped like horses.

Children are always encouraged to write their own original entries if they can. One child wrote, "We ran by colors." We raved over that simple explanation of our game. Sharing ideas helps the other children to be creative.
apple

THE BOOK
It is very thrilling for me to have the opportunity to use my book in the classroom with my children. Each year, I get very excited when I see the children engaged in the book. Today I noticed a little boy absorbed in a page at the back of the book. He was reading the healthy chocolate chip recipe. "I'm going to ask my mother to make these cookies tonight."
"The cookies are great if you follow the recipe exactly," I replied. "Your mother needs to buy whole-wheat pastry flour." To be honest, I am hooked on these cookies. They are still a treat and shouldn't be eaten by the dozens, but they do use whole-wheat flour instead of white flour. They use healthy canola oil instead of crisco or butter. The amount of sugar is cut in half, and there is added wheat germ for more nutrition. I do use chocolate chips, but a lesser amount than the original Toll House recipe calls for. I grew up loving chocolate chip cookies. They always gave me a little mental lift. But later in life I gave them up for a long time when health came before food cravings. Now I find my healthy recipe to be more tasty than the original.

apple

MORE FOOTPRINTS
Club was almost over and I remembered the extra footprints and stickers. I asked the children if any of them had attended our town fun run the weekend before. Lots of hand went up. I told the children that if they ran the childrens' sprints, the mile run, or the 5-K, they could put 2 extra footprints on their chart.

And the stickers! I had special fruit stickers for anyone who brought a healthy fruit snack to club that day. The children started commenting, "I brought an apple. I ate a banana. Do grapes count?"

fun