West Hants Middle School, Newport, NS
Grant term 2020-2022
For the second run of the Try it Tuesday project, we incorporated food literacy activities to go with the snacks!
Learning Objectives:
- Provide an opportunity for students to try something new and local!
- Students will become familiar with the major ingredient of the snacks from plates to plants through a taste test and completing an online quiz.
- Students will be encouraged to think about the idea of local and whole foods, what consist of what they eat, and how to incorporate local and less processed foods in their daily meals.
163 and 169 responses were collected from the quiz and the feedback survey respectively. Although the number of responses were much less than the number collected from the first run of the event. Some responses were completed by a group of students or by a whole class together.
Overall, the majority of the students (an average of 81.3%) enjoyed the Try it Tuesday event. The project achieved the objective to provide students something new and local to try as more than 80% of students never tried the type of snacks provided before. More than half of the students agreed that they learnt more about the major ingredient in the snack and gained better understanding on the idea of local and whole foods from the quiz activity.
Sweet potato tortilla was the most popular item with 67% of students agreed that they would choose this snack if it were available at school; while the tomato smoothie was the least favourite (6.8% approval). It was interesting to find that how the idea of tomato put students off of the smoothie.
Some encouraging comments from students:
“If we were to try it again we should try something else local.” “It was more fun than eating the snack.”
“I like that we get to try food”
“Thank you for letting us try it!”
“Thanks for Try it Tuesday!!! :)”
For more information visit www.thestationfoodhub.ca or email rebecca@thestationfoodhub.ca
Try it Tuesday!
526 individually packaged snacks were delivered to the West Hants Middle School. Students from Grade 6, 7, and 8 participated in over three weeks in February and March 2021. Ingredients were sourced from local farms and were in season. All snacks meet the maximum nutrition criteria for the Food and Nutrition Policy for Nova Scotia Public Schools.
Here are the three healthy snacks featured this month:
The food literacy piece was provided to the teachers in the form of a poster and an online quiz, which were designed specific to the featured snack. Each poster gives teachers clear learning objectives, detailed instructions for the activity, and an extension activity option.
The materials used in the quizzes were all evidence-based and were put together by our dietitians, nutrition volunteers, and The Station Food Hub team. Plants to Plates Activity Guide – A Food Education Program for Kids, by the Ecology Action Centre, was referenced.
For more on The Station Food Hub, check out their evaluation toolkit.
