Game-based food education: Medical students think it's silly enough to work
Picture this game: There are two teams of 10 and 11 year-olds. Each team has to answer a smorgasbord of food-related questions in order to move forward in the game. The kids themselves are the life-sized game pieces, wearing straw-brimmed hats loaded with fruits and vegetables.
Flynn students participate in game-based food education
The game board is a dozen laminated paper cut-outs of foods for each team, representing foods that could go on “My Plate.” When a team member lands on a specified taste-test piece of the game board, everyone gets a bite to eat, whether it’s as simple as a local carrot, as novel as kohlrabi, or as funky as pickled beets. The sky’s the limit for the tastings. Whichever team advances to the front of the board first and puts their food pieces in the right place on the poster of “My Plate” wins. Fun, right? That's what 50 Burlington elementary students recently thought.
A group of 2nd-year medical students working on public health projects at UVM developed this game last semester for City Market and the Burlington School Food Project. They focused on 5th grade students at Flynn Elementary School. Flynn offers a healthy school breakfast and lunch that complies with the National School Lunch Program standards, as well as a well-stocked salad bar with in-season local foods. However, in observations during lunches, the medical students noticed that few students were taking advantage of all of the fresh and healthy options. With childhood obesity in the national spotlight, the medical students wondered whether game-based food education could provoke changes in the kids’ eating habits.
Medical students get silly and teach food education at Flynn Elementary School
Results from surveys the students conducted showed that after the game, students reported an increase in liking both the color of vegetables (half, vs. a mere third) and the texture of fruits (half, vs. just a quarter). The medical students recommended tailoring the taste-tests in the game to foods likely to soon appear on the salad bars at each school. This dovetails well with the Burlington School Food Project’s aim to conduct more in-classroom food education to allow more time for kids to familiarize themselves with new foods.
We’re looking forward to trotting out this game ourselves, perhaps at a future farmer’s market, after-school program, or other places where kids and food meet (and really, where do they not?).
Many thanks to Burlington Farm-To-School Coordinator Sarah Heusner, faculty mentor and Co-op member Dr. Robert Luby, and the medical students for carrying this public health project to fruit-ion: Adam Ackerman, Karina Eastman, Albert Emery, Paige Georgiadis, Camilo Martinez, David Reisman, and Maramawit Wubeshet.