How might we teach kids to see the connection between food and being healthy?
In the summer of 2014, One Stone students met with residents from the Idaho Youth Ranch’s Hays Shelter Home, and identified a mutual passion for helping families affected by cancer. Using the design thinking process, they pivoted to a more specific prevention-focused goal, zeroing in on the connection between a healthy diet and prevention. After extensive research and empathy work in the field, the team designed a project to teach kids to make healthy, disease-fighting snacks and meals that were easy to prepare and easy to incorporate in their day-to-day lives.
In the prototyping phase, One Stone students visited a second grade classroom to test their recipes and accompanying curriculum with kids. The team worked with the second graders to make very inventive fruit art, peanut butter spiders and Cheerio necklaces. To wrap up the lesson, the One Stone team taught the students the original Fruit and Veggie dance, and brought down the house!
Eat to Beat culminated in the final project in May. One Stone students led a cooking and nutritional information class in space provided by our partner, Create Common Good. Hays Shelter Home residents and youth affected by cancer learned to make anti-oxidant rich smoothies, a lean, mean strawberry-spinach chicken salad, and a delectable mango-lime crumble. All while playing nutrition related games and having conversation about healthy living.
Outcomes:
93% of recipients reported that they now knew that healthy eating was correlated to fighting disease.
100% of recipients reported an increase in knowledge about healthy eating.
In their own words:
“It was really fun, super educational and the food was good,” reported one recipient.
“I would say that I learned a lot about how certain foods can help fight diseases.”
