As a part of Needham Public Schools’ (NPS) Политика оздоровления, NPS is committed to their students’ health and well-being, their ability to learn nutrition concepts in the curriculum, and offering nutrition promotion as part of the school lunch program. Nutrition education and resources are provided for students, parents, and teachers on Needham Public Schools Nutrition Services website. Resources include nutrition lessons for teachers, healthy habits and recipes for parents, and fun games for students.  

On March 28^th, 2022, Framingham State University student dietitian, Cindi Powell, helped the district provide nutrition education in the classrooms through a lesson taught to kindergarten students at Newman Elementary School in Needham.  

During this lesson, Cindi taught the students about fruits and vegetable using the alphabet to show that fruits and veggies start with all different letters. Using the book, Eating the Alphabet they explored a variety of fruits and vegetables, where students learned about new ones they have never heard of and identified ones they were familiar with. Afterwards, the students participated in a fun activity where they were assigned a letter of the alphabet and were asked to draw all the fruits and veggies they could think of that started with that letter. By the end of the lesson, the students were excited to share which fruits and veggies they had drawn and what their favorites were. 

To explore more nutrition and wellness resources that can be used both in and out of the classroom, please visit the resource center on the SWITCH Website. 

Submitted by: Cindi Powell, FSU Food and Nutrition Graduate Student in the Скоординированная программа по диетологии