Fit Families

Elizabeth's school has been taking part in a pilot project being run by the local council called "Fit Families". There were 6 sessions run at the school covering different aspects of keeping healthy e.g exercise, balanced diets and growing your own food.

The children each got a t-shirt, a folder with weekly homework tasks, and they came home with a Broad Bean Plant at the end of the 6 weeks.

Week 1 - Let's Get Active!

The NHS recommends that all children over 5 years need at least 60 minutes of physical activity every day.

In the session at school we did lots of running, jumping, skipping, hopping activities and we were set homework for the half tern to keep a log of activities that we did. There was a Facebook page set up for us to share photos and we could win prizes for sharing photos and stories of our activities.
Our activities included playing Wii Fit, bike rides, walking around Gressenhall, playing at the park, soft play and an awesome obstacle course that I made in the house.

Week 2 - Let's Get Growing!

We believe there are similarities between a healthy child and a healthy plant! Both require good nutrition, fluids and sunlight to develop healthily and reach their full potential.

In the session in school we had a run around to get the heart beating faster and hot foreheads. Then each child got to plant their own marrow fat pea which they had to look after at school, making sure it got plenty of sunlight and water.

Week 3 - Mix it up!
This session was all about having a balanced diet. We learned about carbohydrates, fruit and vegetables, proteins, milk and dairy and sugar and fats. Although a lot of the information went over the children's heads, they did get the message that too much sugar and fats were not good!
Elizabeth chose not to eat her cereal bar in the packed lunch that day because that was mentioned as being too sugary.
The homework this week was to write a food diary for one day and split it up into carbs, proteins etc. I think Elizabeth's diet is pretty good as it is. She eats a tonne of fruit, which helps make up for the lack of vegetables in her diet. And I have seen her taking fruit over sugary treats when offered. It's easy for me to not give her sugary treats. I have cut back on them since taking part in this project. However, I do let the girls have home baked treats. At least then I know how much sugar is in it!

Week 4 - Sugar and Salt

The NHS states that a child between 4-6 years old should have no more than 3g of salt a day and an adult 6g a day. Too much salt can increase your blood pressure and may lead to heart disease or a stroke.

Many foods contain high levels of hidden sugars and eating these on a regular basis with limited exercise can lead to weight gain and an increased risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

In the session we were to guess how many teaspoons of sugar there were in certain products. We also looked at the traffic light nutrition labels on food to see what was healthy and what was not. It was quite surprising just how much sugar it is possible to consume in a day without really thinking about it!
The homework was to swap some foods in our diet so that we had less salt and less sugar. I decided to switch to brown bread and to stick with fruit for sweet snacks. Elizabeth and Rebecca are addicted to strawberries now!

Week 5 - Eat a Rainbow!
We learned about having 5 fruit and vegetables a day and how different fruits and vegetables contain different vitamins and minerals. Elizabeth impressed everyone by knowing lots of fruits and vegetables, when others in the class didn't recognise them.
We had a fruit diary again this week where we listed the food eaten in a rainbow chart. Elizabeth ate a lot of reds - peppers, tomatoes, strawberries and red apples. But she did not really have many greens!

Week 6 - Grow Your Own!
In the last session we recapped about eating 5 fruit and vegetables a day and we planted strawberry plants at the school. As mentioned before each child was also given a broad bean plant to take home and look after.

The sessions have finished now, but as a bonus the Fit Families group have challenged us to take Selfies on walks around the local area during the Easter Holidays. We have done one already.

Walk 1 - St Mary's Church and Loch Neaton

It's been a really interesting project to be involved in. It has made me think about what we are eating at home, so it has been successful in that respect. The girls do have a reasonably balanced diet and they don't have too many sugary and fatty treats, those sorts of foods have gradually been sneaking into our shopping more and more, but there is no need for them when the girls are happy to eat fruit.

We've always been quite active with the girls, they cannot go a whole day at home doing nothing. The Wii has been a great addition to their activities for rainy days, and we might not have thought about using it with the girls had it not been for this project. But on dry days we're always out walking, geocaching, cycling, playing at the park or having a day at Gressenhall!