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Activities Included

Rubix Relay ◦ Tic Tac Toe Relay ◦ Foodie Phone ◦ Pass the Potato/Peaches/Paneer ◦ Food Category Collectors: Rock, Paper, Scissors Style ◦ Silent Snack Sequence ◦ One Room Scavenger Hunt ◦ Would You Rather? ◦ The Parachute Smoothie Blend ◦ Plate and Pass

 

➡️ Considerations

  • Safety: Establish a safe movement speed for the space and encourage students to practise spatial awareness.    
  • Language: Use food neutral language.  
    • Call foods by name.  
    • Approach conversations with respect and curiosity.  
    • Create and maintain a welcoming space to talk and learn about food.  
  • Student Leadership: Consider using game leaders in place of teachers or staff to lead the activities and act as peer mentors.   
  • Share: Consider sharing this resource with lunchroom supervisors who may be able to support activity facilitation.  
  • Practice: Play the games during class time to increase students’ comfort level at recess and reduce the time needed for rules and explanations.   

Explore the activities

I Want It All!

Get all 10 indoor recess activities in one convenient PDF for easy reference.

Grades K to 3

Grades 4 to 6

Foodie Phone

Students form a line or circle and whisper a secret food name to the next person. The goal is to get the food order right all the way to the last person! This is a twist on the classic game of telephone.

Grades K to 3

Grades 4 to 6

Pass the... Potato... Paneer... Pita

Students stand in a circle passing a food card around until the leader says, “Stop!” The student holding the card must them race around the outside of the circle back to their spot.

Grades K to 3

Grades 4 to 6

One-Room Scavenger Hunt

Students move around the room to find and collect a Food Card that matches a called-out descriptor, such as a specific texture, colour, shape, or origin.

Grades K to 3

Grades 4 to 6

Would You Rather?

Students stand on a centre line and hop forward or backward to explore their personal food preferences by choosing between two foods.

Grades K to 3

Grades 4 to 6

Parachute Smoothie Blend

Students work together using a parachute to pretend they are blending a huge smoothie, tossing in balls to represent chosen Food Cards and shaking the fabric at different speeds to mix the ingredients.

Grades K to 3

Rubix Relay

Small teams of students race relay-style to swap adjacent food cards vertically or horizontally on a 3x3 grid. The goal is to arrange matching food categories in straight lines.

Grades 4 to 6

Tic-Tac-Toe Relay

Students race relay-style to place category-specific food cards onto a grid, working with their team to get three of their assigned items in a row.

Grades 4 to 6

Food Category Collectors: Rock, Paper, Scissors Style

Students move through the space playing rock, paper, scissors, collecting food cards as they win. The first student to collect a food card from all three categories (vegetables and fruits, whole grain foods, and protein foods) wins!

Grades 4 to 6

Silent Snack Sequence

Students stand in silent circles and invent a unique body movement for their Food Cards. These movements are their “tag actions.” To pass the turn, a student performs their own action and then immediately copies a classmate’s action to tag them. That classmate then does the same.

Grades 4 to 6

Plate and Pass

Students work in small groups to pick and pass Food Cards over three rounds. They use their collected cards to invent and present a three-course menu.

Grades 4 to 6

Order your free kit and view the other activities

Learn More

Grades K to 3

Grades 4 to 6

Food Picture Kit: Order Here

The Food Picture Kit is a free bilingual K–6 resource with cards, posters, and a guide.
Learn More

Grades K to 3

Grades 4 to 6

Food Picture Kit: Literacy Activities

Discover 16 literacy activities that complement the Food Picture Kit for grades K–6.
Learn More