Teaching Sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

10 minutes – Part A: Hidden sugar detectives
20 minutes – Part B: How to interpret nutritional information
25 minutes – Part C: Be a sugar-wise chef
15 minutes – Part D: Researching alternatives
5 minutes – Reflection

Part A: Hidden sugar detectives

Step 1.

Engage students in the lesson by asking them what some of their favourite foods are. Encourage a discussion about why this might be, and share any memories around this food. End the conversation by drawing attention to the pleasure that often comes from food, which you saw as they willingly shared their favourite food stories!

Remind students that food is a big part of our lives and culture, but what we eat does impact our health.

Step 2.

Bring out the items of packaged food your class has brought in.

If you have students with any known food allergies or are working with COVID-safe restrictions, you may wish to take photos and use these instead of the physical items. Keep in mind some students may live in a ‘wholefoods’ household, so they may have to find an image online of a packaged food.

Ask students to work as a class to first order the foods from what they’d predict has the least sugar to the most sugar, then how many teaspoons of sugar they think would be in each. After this activity, ask students to justify why they have made this choice.

Step 3.

Reveal the correct order for these foods. You will need to be familiar with how to read a nutrition panel to do this. You can review this beforehand by finding the instructions in the teacher content information of this lesson.

Part B: How to interpret nutrition information

Step 1.

Explain that pre-packaged foods, even those that might seem healthier, often have added sugars to preserve them and make them tastier. That’s why things we don’t even think of as sweet - such as salt and vinegar chips - usually still have sugar added. One of the problems with having a lot of sugar in our diets is its impact on our kidneys. Our kidneys are responsible for filtering our blood by removing what our bodies do not need, such as excess sugar. If you have not completed the Meet your kidneys lesson, you could view the video to show students what this means.

Step 2.

Tell students there’s an easy way to tell how much sugar is in a food product by reading the ingredients and nutritional panel. Hand out or project, the Nutrition Information Panel sheet, explaining how to read nutrition panels on Australian packaged foods.

Then direct students’ attention to the other names for added sugar. Explain that knowing the difference between added and natural sugars is an essential part of being a sugar detective.

Explain to students that the Australian Government website (www.eatforhealth.gov.au) website has clear information about how much sugar should be consumed and what is considered a healthy amount of sugar.

If sugar content per 100g is more than 15g, check that sugar (or alternative names for added sugar) is not listed high on the ingredient list. A general rule of thumb is to choose foods with less than 10g per 100g.
For milk, yogurt, and ice cream, choose less than 2g per 100g.
For cheese, choose less than 15g per 100g.

For example, a random cereal picked out of the supermarket was found to have an average serving of 24.2 g of sugar per 100g, which is 14.2 above the recommended amount of sugar. If you have a look at the ingredient list, you might notice other words for sugar, such as sugar, maltodextrin, molasses, barley malt.

Step 3.

With students, use the food packaging from your activity in Part A to practice reading the nutritional panel and ingredients list. Find the sugar content per 100g, as well as any added sugars in the ingredients list. Direct students to record these on their Student Worksheet. You may wish to have this set up as a rotation activity, with pairs of students working together and moving to each item.

Differentiated Learning

Extension -

Encourage students who need the challenge to find healthier breakfast alternatives below the 10g per 100g recommendation.

Provision for learning support -

If students are finding it difficult to see the connection between sugar, contents, and food items, provide students with a cut out of a cereal box and ask them to highlight the important figures that relate to sugar and then work out the difference in sugar content to ensure they are able to identify and articulate where added sugar might be located.

Part C: Be A sugar wise chef

Step 1.

Ask students if they think the packaged foods they’ve looked at so far are what they would consider ‘meal’ foods. Then discuss why some of the foods we eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner also have sneaky added sugars, for flavour and preservation. Explain to students that, in the next activity, they are going to find out how much sugar can creep into their meals.
Consideration: Remember to be conscious that families may consume pizza, battered fish and chips, or other frozen meals for various reasons. Reiterate that these lessons are purely here to educate students about the nutritional value of these foods. There is no judgment around what foods and how often you or your family eat these, as food choices are personal decisions.

Step 2.

Break students into groups of two or three. Give each group a device and different packaged meals to investigate, such as frozen pizza, cereal, muesli bar, a jar of pasta sauce, an apple pie on the Woolworth’s website.

Ask students to read the nutrition information panel and the ingredients. Record what sugar has been added to these items and how much. You could set this out similarly to the table on the Student Worksheet.

Ask students if they are surprised by what they have found in the ingredients? And if there are other ways to add flavour to meals, such as using particular herbs and spices.

It is essential to be sensitive to how different cultures use sugar. For example, some cultures add sugar to red pasta sauce as it balances the acidity of the tomatoes, whilst other cultures create sauces by adding sugar to ingredients such as sweet chili, sweet and sour sauce, etc.

Step 3.

Once you have addressed how and where sugar is added to foods, invite students to discuss the following:

Which foods surprised you the most and why?
After viewing the graph, which items do you think might become ‘sometimes’ and ‘treat’ foods?
What could you do to decrease the sugar content in your food or meals?

Part D: Researching alternatives

In their pairs or small groups, provide students with a device to research recipes for one of these meals, without relying on added sugars. You can direct students to a healthy website or ask them to provide some resources they like to use for healthy eating and cooking. Cooking shows and researching healthy recipes can positively affect behaviours and attitudes by promoting togetherness and healthy perceptions of food.

List some healthy websites and ask students to contribute and add some suggestions:

Woolworths healthy alternatives
The Sugar by Half website provides some ideas for breakfast and dinner swaps.

If you or your class does not know of any healthy cooking blogs or shows for students, you may like to research these as a class.

They can record a new recipe, including the ingredients and listed sugar content, on their Student Worksheet.

To adapt this activity, you could ask students to select a meal that they regularly eat, such as toast and peanut butter or baked beans on toast. They could then investigate brand and product alternatives that have less sugar. For example, if a student enjoys eating peanut butter on toast every morning but Kraft peanut butter has more sugar than a natural peanut butter brand, they might discover that they should eat a smaller amount.

Reflection

Ask students to complete a 3, 2, 1 reflection:

3 new things I’ve learned:
2 things I found interesting:
1 new action I’ll take:

Differentiated Learning

Extension –
If possible, prepare one of the meals a group has researched, ensuring you consider any policies in place at your school and the dietary requirements of your students. This will allow you to incorporate reading procedural texts and other elements of measurement.
Explore why the increase in sugar consumption has occurred by researching the changing diets of Australians over time. This could be done by interviewing older relatives about their food habits growing up.
Use the Bush Tucker and kidney disease handbook to investigate some of the non-processed foods that are a regular part of Indigenous Australians’ diets.

Provisions for Learning Support –
Locate recipes to provide to students who may find the research task challenging.

Teacher Reflection

Take this opportunity to reflect on your own teaching:

What did you learn about your teaching practice today?
What worked well?
What didn't work so well?
What would you share?
Where to next?
How are you going to get there?

SugarByHalf - Healthier Options

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