Unit 8 - Be Fit
Be Fit! Understanding Health and Physical Activity Through STEAM
General Learning Objectives
At the end of this unit, students will be able to:
- Identify key factors influencing health (hygiene, nutrition, exercise, and rest).
- Measure and interpret changes in pulse during different phases of physical activity.
- Use mobile apps to monitor health-related data (e.g., heart rate).
- Design a fitness routine with warm‑up, activity, and cool‑down phases.
- Create comics illustrating safe and healthy physical habits.
- Represent collected health data using tables and bar graphs.
- Pulse meter apps (on tablets or phones)
- Stopwatch or timer
- Paper and coloured markers
- Comic strip templates
- Computers or tablets with basic drawing or chart software
- Worksheets with data tables
- Grid paper for graphs
Activity 1 – Healthy Habits Discussion: The Foundations of a Healthy Life
Objective:
Help students understand the key pillars of a healthy lifestyle and their effects on the body and mind.
Description.
1. Class Discussion:
Begin with an interactive discussion by asking:
- What does it mean to be healthy?
- Can you name things we do every day that affect our health?
- Sleep – Why we need it, how many hours children need (9–11 hours), and how it affects energy and focus.
- Exercise – Importance of daily movement for heart health, strong muscles, and mental well‑being.
- Nutrition – Healthy food vs. junk food; benefits of balanced meals, water, fruits, and vegetables.
- Rest & Relaxation – Screen‑free time, mental breaks, and hobbies.
- Have students work in small groups to list examples of good and bad habits related to each pillar.
- They can create a "Healthy Life Poster" with drawings or keywords.
- Come back together and create a class chart with the top habits listed under each pillar.
- Emphasise how these elements are interconnected.
Activity 2 – Measure Your Heart Rate with Technology
.
Objective:
Understand how physical activity affects the heart using mobile technology.
Materials:
- Smartphones or tablets (shared or individual)
- Free pulse‑measuring apps (e.g., Instant Heart Rate, Heart Rate Monitor, Cardiio)
- Internet access (if needed)
- Recording sheets or digital table templates
- Explain how the heart pumps blood and how the pulse reflects physical effort.
- Discuss differences between resting, walking, and running pulse rates.
- Show students how to open the app, place a finger gently over the camera lens, and stay still while it measures.
- Test accuracy by repeating the measurement twice.
- Students perform a light physical activity (e.g., 30 seconds of star jumps or jogging in place).
- Immediately afterwards, they use the app to measure their pulse and record it.
- What changed?
- Why did it change?
Activity 3 – Fitness Circuit Stations
Objective:
Combine fitness and engineering by designing and rotating through activity stations.
Steps
- Students brainstorm different exercises (e.g., push-ups, squats, skipping).
- In groups, they design a station including materials and instructions.
- All groups try each other's stations and monitor pulse before and after.
- Use the same stations for the games Give and Take & Tag with Safe Base to measure their pulse afterwards.
Endurance Game 1 – “Give and Take”
.
Setup:
- 4 players, 5 hoops
- Square formation with 1 hoop in each corner and 1 in the center
- 6 bean bags placed in the central hoop
- Side length: 5–10 meters
- Each player starts in a corner hoop.
- Goal: Collect 3 bean bags in your own hoop first.
- Players first take from the center, then may steal from others.
- Only one bean bag at a time.
- Bean bags must be placed, not thrown.
- Use 5 bean bags to increase difficulty.
- Pair players for larger groups.
- Create pentagon or hexagon formations.
- Change movement style (jumping, hopping, crawling, skipping, etc.).
- Use different equipment (balls, discs, etc.).
- Check the surface and shoelaces.
- No aggressive behaviour.
- The first player to touch a bean bag has the right to take it.
Endurance Game 2 – “Tag with Safe Base”
.
Setup:
- Playing area with several hula hoops as safe bases
- Only one player per hoop.
- Maximum stay in the hoop: 5–10 seconds.
- Players can replace another by jumping into their hoop.
- The tagged player becomes the new tagger and announces it.
- Adjust the number of hoops (2–6) depending on group size and skill.
- Light tagging only (shoulders or lower).
- No pushing.
- Sufficient space from walls.
- Shoelaces tied.
Activity 4 – Health Data Analysis
Objective:
Apply mathematics to health data.
Steps
- Students compile pulse data from previous activities.
- Calculate differences and averages.
- Create bar graphs or line charts.
- Identify patterns and draw health‑related conclusions.
Activity 5 – Create Your Fitness Comic
Objective:
Communicate healthy routines through visual storytelling.
Steps
- Students are introduced to comic strip storytelling.
- They plan a simple comic where a character teaches another how to do a safe warm-up, main exercises, and cool-down.
- Students create comics using drawings, speech bubbles, diagrams, and colour to create the comic.
- Optional: Use tablets/computers to create digital versions.
- Use AI to generate images.
Wrap‑Up and Reflection
Discuss:
- Why does physical activity affect the pulse?
- How to design a balanced fitness plan?
- How do science, technology, engineering, art, and maths work together to understand health?
STEPAM
- Science - Students learn about hygiene, sleep, nutrition, and how the body reacts to exercise, like pulse changes.
- Technology- They use mobile apps to measure heart rate and display data visually.
- Engineering - Students plan fitness routines and design comic-style exercise sequences.
- Physical Education - They practise warm-up, main activities, and cool-down, adjusting effort based on pulse.
- Art - Students create comics to illustrate safe exercises using drawings and storytelling.
- Mathematics - Reading, creating, and interpreting bar graphs and tables. Measuring and representing pulse data before, during, and after physical activity.
