Here's what you need: Paper plates, crayons, a black sharpie or black paint (I used puffy), scissors, 1 piece of paper bigger than your paper plates, stickers (optional), and old magazines or scrap paper.
1. Divide, color and label your plates into the same quadrents as the example on the website or copy my photo. Notice that the Vegetable and Grain sections are larger than the Fruit and Protien sections. (This is based on portion recommendations and something to keep in mind when talking/making this craft with your kids.) I found that I had to either write the letters with the sharpie before using the crayons to color the sections OR use the puffy paint after coloring the sections because the sharpie doesn't write on the waxy crayon. :)
2. Place one of your plates in the center of the large piece of paper. Draw a circle with a 'D' for dairy and color it blue up where you would place a cup on your place mat. Decorate the rest of the place mat however you'd like! I used stickers of active kids and vegetables but really anything goes! (You could even go one step further and laminate your place mats so that the kids can use them for actual meal times!)
3. Have fun finding and cutting out different foods to put on your plates to make meals. Use this time to talk about the different food groups, why each one is so important for your body and how our bodies respond with too much or too little food (proper portioning). Also could help with getting kids to try and talk about new foods. Of course you know your kids best as far as their ages and how much and what information they are able to understand so use that as your guide as you create and learn together.
4. See how many different meal combinations you can come up with! Did you cut out enough for all three meals in the day and snacks too? Maybe start with one meal and use this as an on-going tool to talk about healthy eating. Also could be used as a sneaky meal-planner!! Gotta love multi-tasking! Let your kids help plan the meals for the week using their plates.
For more facts and resources head to these great sites:
