Food and drinks (5-7 Years)

Activity 1 - We need food and drink to stay alive.

Ask the children the following questions to start them thinking about food and drinks.

• What types of food and drinks do you like/dislike?
• What meals do we usually eat during the day?
• At what times are these meals eaten?
• How do you feel when it is nearly lunchtime or at other times when you need some food?

Draw a person on the board and write or draw children’s responses to how they feel when they need food or a drink around the person (e.g. tummy rumbles, feel tired or grumpy, find it hard to work or concentrate). Talk to the children about why they think they might get these feelings.

Explain that the body needs food, and water from drinks, to keep us alive. When we have feelings of hunger and thirst, it is our body reminding us that it needs food and water.

You might wish to talk to them about how they feel when they are ‘full’ or eat too much.

Task the children to complete the When I am hungry worksheet. Ask them to draw their face when they are hungry and when they have eaten.

Activity 2 - We need food to grow, be active and maintain health.

Question the children to help them consider why we need food. 

• Why do we need food?
• What does food do?

Collect children’s responses in words or illustrations and steer children to consider the things our bodies do during the day, e.g. growing, learning, playing and healing.  Use the Food – a fact of life presentation to facilitate the discussion.

Explain to the children that we need food to grow, be active and stay healthy.

Ask the children to complete the How does food help my body? worksheet. Get them to draw or write about how food helps their body. Ask them to share their work with others. You could use the children’s completed sheets to create a display.

For younger children, you could write in the words before photocopying the sheet so they can copy underneath. 

Further activities

• Create a class food and drink display.
• Draw or paint a favourite meal.
• Role play a meal occasion.

Reviewed November 2023