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Nutritious Mangos: From the Menu to the Classroom
The National Mango Board (NMB) supports nutrition education and has developed an online portal, ManGO! Kids, to provide kids with fun, educational activities and resources to teach them about mangos and how to integrate them into a balanced diet. ManGO! Kids also provides educators with new, interactive tools for teaching students about nutrition through the world’s most popular fruit—the mango. With varieties arriving to the U.S. from the top six importing countries year-round, there is an opportunity for a non-stop mango experience at school or home.
Teaching Fruitful Lessons. Through the ManGO! Kids portal, teachers can download the mango geography poster to teach students about where mangos are grown and other fun facts. Students can learn about geography, history, and culture by playing the interactive Jango Geography game with the official mango ambassador, Jango Mango, as their guide. To test students on what they’ve learned, teachers can download bilingual games and quizzes.
ManGO! Kids Get Moving. Teachers can pump up the energy in their classroom by having students practice their dance moves to the Mango Fandango – a mango song and dance that will have kids singing facts about mangos and their producing countries. To encourage creativity and appeal to kinesthetic learners, teachers can have their students create their own Mango Masterpiece – a unique mango character or holiday decoration – as part of any lesson plan.
Tasty Mango Homework. ManGO! Kids aren’t just found in the classroom. Students will think mango homework is delicious. By downloading the Jango Mango Match Game widget, students and teachers can instantly access mango games any time. Of course, one of the easiest (and tastiest) ways to get to know a mango is through your taste buds. Try NMB’s fun and healthy recipe ideas, such as Fruity Mango Roll Ups, Mango Oat Breakfast Bars, Mango and Bacon Barbecue Pizza, and Tropical Mango Sorbet. Plus, Chef Allen “The Mango Man” Susser also shows kids easy ways to enjoy mangos in his Meet a Mango video.
Why Mangos? Educators will find that engaging students in mango nutrition education is easy because mangos are not only the world’s most popular fruit, they have real nutritional benefits for kids (and adults) of all ages. Mangos are an excellent source of vitamins A and C, a good source of dietary fiber, and a one cup serving is only 110 calories. With more than 20 vitamins and minerals, and a score of 93 out of 100 on the NuVal nutrition scoring system, mangos are a sweet way to get kids to eat their daily amount of fruit.
Whichever way you slice it , mangos are a tasty and nutritious food to share with kids. For more information on mangos and how to incorporate them into your school menu and nutrition education curriculum, visit www.mango.org. Want to read more?
Click here to download the entire Winter 2010 Newsletter.
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