To teach the main food groups to children, cut out pictures of different foods -- hand-drawn or cut from a magazine -- and have kids stick them onto a poster of the food pyramid. The pyramid is a colorful, interactive method of building awareness of balanced eating. Emphasize colorful foods like fruits and vegetables, which form the second-most bottom rung of the pyramid. As a twist on the activity, ask parents to send their kids with lists of what they ate the day before, and have the kids add pictures of those foods to the pyramid.
Make-a-Plate can be an individual or small group activity. Like the Pyramid Matchup, it involves kids putting representations of different foods onto a plate. Encourage them to balance their meals: some starch, some veggies, and some meat. If you have a daily snack time, that's a good opportunity to use real food for the exercise. Crackers and veggies with peanut butter are yummy yet healthy foods to use.
Unflavored popcorn is a healthy, low-fat snack. Explain to children the benefits of eating these healthier foods while having them decorate art with the kernels. Prepare templates ahead of time of things such as snowmen or ears of corn. The best part of it is that the kids have a snack for later. You can also do this activity with nuts, assuming that no one has a nut allergy.
To make a nutrition-promoting art project, find some food magazines and a large picture of a rainbow. For every stripe of the rainbow, get kids to find matching foods. Try to use pictures of healthy items as much as possible, such as blueberries, grapes, broccoli and watermelon. The rainbow encourages kids to think of the variety as fun, a lesson that may stick with them when it's time to sit down for dinner.