Remote learning resources to the rescue

For teachers, pupils and parents/carers, a return to remote learning at the start of 2021 brings with it plenty of challenges! If you are looking for resources, ideas and tips to support remote learning, then look no further, Food – a fact of life (FFL) has ideas and resources to support the great work teachers are doing at this time!

Activities and ideas

To support remote learning, we have created a range of nearly 600 ideas, activities and resources, covering lots of food-based topics and themes, including: everyday learning, cooking, keeping active, healthy eating, where food comes from, ingredients, food skills for life and STEM.

Many activities and ideas are suitable for independent learning and do not require the use of a computer/the internet. The remote learning resources have been organised into ‘waves’ and categorised as either a task that take less time and/or is less complex or a task that takes more time and/or is more complex.

Here are some examples of popular activities from the most viewed ‘waves’:

• Around your kitchen (Wave 1):
  Have a look in your kitchen and find six different pieces of equipment that can be used to either prepare or cook food with. (Here's some images, just in case!) Suggest a food or dish that could be made using each piece of equipment.  Why not find a recipe and make one of the dishes you suggested, if you have ingredients available?
• Cooking, food hygiene and safety: (Wave 4):
  Run-down kitchen - draw a picture of a kitchen that shows lots of different food hygiene and safety hazards. Highlight each of the hazards! At the side of the picture, list the hazards and suggest how these could be prevented or corrected.
• Food and literacy (Wave 6):
  Make a list of the food in your house that is currently in season in the UK. What could you make with the food you find? Make a seasonal dish this week!

As well as being grouped in ‘waves’, the remote learning activities have also been organised by topic. So, if you are looking for resources to support a particular topic, such as healthy eating, cooking or where food comes from, you will quickly be able to find them here.

An interactive games and quizzes section, with printable/downloadable certificates for pupils, has been added to the remote learning area. These are available for both primary and secondary pupils, cover a range of different topics and include games, click and drag activities, interactive videos, matching games, and much more!

Videos to support learning

The layout of our YouTube channel has been updated to make finding videos you and your pupils need easier than ever! Playlists for different remote learning topics have been created, so whether you are looking for videos to complement the work taught in your online lessons, or if you want to set pupils recipe and cooking videos to follow along with from home, you can find the playlist to best support your needs. We also have playlists to support lockdown learning for teachers, including all of the webinars from FFL, BNF Healthy Eating Week, and videos on teaching food and nutrition. Don’t forget to subscribe to be alerted as to when new videos become available!

How about parents/carers?

Lockdown learning can be challenging for parents/carers, with many having to fit home teaching around their own busy schedule and work. We have put together some tips to help parents/carers when supporting their children’s remote learning at home. There are also a range of parental engagement resources, including some brand new ones to help parents of young children encourage their child to learn about, and eat more, vegetables!

Opportunity to enhance your own personal and professional development?

Even though we are in another lockdown period, there are still opportunities to enhance your own professional development and learn from home with Food – a fact of life. You can take on our online training courses (see below), or catch up on any teacher CPD webinars that you may have missed on our YouTube channel! And just because we are in lockdown, this doesn’t mean we are no longer running our FFL training. We have virtual conferences for teachers in England, Northern Ireland and Wales coming soon, along with a continuing programme of 30-minute webinars. You can register now!

FFL online training events include:

Childhood obesity: How much is food education in schools part of the solution?

• England (30/01/21)
• Northern Ireland (27/02/21)
• Wales (20/03/21)

Webinars:

• How do I create a worksheet? (03/02/21)
• A thematic approach to teaching food and nutrition in primary schools (24/03/21)

There is also a range of presentations and other support materials in the Professional development area of the website and a series of online training courses, perfect for both primary and secondary teachers. These include:

Primary online training:

• Characteristics of good practice in teaching food and nutrition education (primary)
• Teaching food in primary (England) – the what, when and how?
• Teaching food in primary (Northern Ireland) – the what, when and how?
• Teaching food in primary (Scotland) – the what, when and how?
• Teaching food in primary (Wales) – the what, when and how?

Secondary online training:

• Sensory science
• Characteristics of good practice in teaching food and nutrition education (secondary)

Whether you are looking for resources to support pupils, or wanting to ensure you stay up-to-date with your own professional development, Food – a fact of life provides a range of activities and resources to help you out during lockdown.