CAPTAIN CHOLESTEROL

and the

GRANNIES from MARS

Teachers’ notes

Key Stage 1

INTRODUCTION

Captain Cholesterol and the Grannies from Mars is based on Attainment Target 2 of the National Curriculum for Science and explores the sections on health and nutrition.

During the play we look at exercise, what happens to our teeth, what makes a balanced diet and in general how to achieve a healthy lifestyle.

The play takes the form of a mystery as we follow our two heroes, Fox Mouldy and Dana Scullery from the FBI (Fruit Bureau of Investigation) as they get to the bottom of the strange goings on in the sleepy village of Much Merrydown.

A HEALTHY LIFESTYLE

Fox Mouldy is called in to investigate an incident at the apple growing contest in the village of Much Merrydown, but during his briefing session his boss points out that he eats all the wrong things and takes no exercise. She explains that for a good diet you need a variety of food. She tells him it’s all right having chips and burgers and the odd sweet thing as long as you have vegetables and fruit as well. She tells him it’s called a balanced diet. She then goes on to say that you also need plenty to drink, you need exercise and you also need rest in order to stay fit and healthy. She sings a song and the audience join in with the chorus:

You gotta get fit, eat healthy

If you wanna stay wise and wealthy.

Good food, exercise and rest

Come on, you know it’s for the best.

Just eat a balanced diet

I wanna see you try it.

Work that body, fuel it right

And then make sure you sleep all night.

So go on, be good to yourself, for health.

EXERCISE

Mouldy discusses with the audience the merits of exercise. He asks them what sort of activities he could do for exercise and then plays a game with the audience:

He describes an activity to them and they have to tell him whether the activity uses loads of energy, quite a bit or not a lot. He tries them on running, watching the television, cycling, walking, swimming and playing computer games and the activities are classified under the appropriate heading.

Mouldy concludes that in order to get fit he will have to give up sitting in front of the television or the computer eating sweets and do more running, cycling, swimming and walking.

EATING A BALANCED DIET

Throughout the play we stress the importance of eating a balanced diet and Scullery explains that we need food in order to be able to move. She tells them that movement needs energy and that we get our energy from food. She explains that food helps build the body and also helps us to grow. But, she stresses, we do need different kinds of food to do this. Scullery introduces the names of the main types of foodstuffs: proteins, carbohydrates and fats. With the help of the audience, she puts together a healthy meal from a variety of foodstuffs. Here is a run-down of the main types of food and what they do:

Proteins: the usual sources of protein are meat, fish and dairy products although strict vegans can gain their protein from beans, pulses and nuts, another good source of protein. Proteins are used by the body to build new cells and to repair damaged tissue. They help the body stay strong.

Carbohydrates: carbohydrates supply most of the energy the body needs and mainly come from bread, pasta, rice and potatoes although hard and leafy vegetables and fruit are also good sources. If the carbohydrate intake exceeds the amount needed by the body then the excess is converted and stored as fat.

Fats: butter, milk, cheese and oils are our main source of fat. Fats contain twice as much energy as carbohydrates, weight for weight, and are stored by the body for use at another time when more energy is needed.

Vitamins and minerals: fruit and vegetables provide most of the vitamins and minerals we need to keep our body functioning properly.

Fibre: fruit, vegetables, wholewheat bread, brown pasta and rice, beans and nuts are all rich in fibre. It has no nutritional value but speeds up digestion and keeps our digestive system healthy. It also helps fill you up!

Water: As two thirds of our body is water we need to drink plenty to keep us healthy. Water dissolves the digested food and carries it around the body in the blood stream. We get about a litre of water a day from our food but we need to ensure we drink at least a litre as well and more if we are exercising hard as we lose a lot of water in sweat.

An experiment in finding fat is foods is to rub brown paper against the foodstuff and holding it up to the light if the paper turns see-through the food has fat in it.

In class the children can cut out paper plate shapes are draw their favourite meals. Which food types do they contain? The children can then draw a balanced meal using foods they like to eat.

A demonstration of how fibre works can be done with a sock, a hard ball and a soft foam ball. Put the hard ball in the sock and squeeze the sock so that the ball moves along. Then try the same thing with the soft ball and compare results.

OUR TEETH

The Cox boys, two young tearaways, have been suffering from terrible toothache and between them Mouldy and the audience think about what sugary things do to your teeth.

Mouldy asks the audience why we need teeth anyway and they work out it’s to cut and grind our food before we swallow it. Then Mouldy shows the audience how teeth rot away using a member of the audience to represent a tooth.

Mouldy tells them that our mouths are full of germs called bacteria which most of the time do no damage. But all this changes when we start to eat sugary things. Mouldy shows them how bacteria love the sugar in sweets and then stick to the outside of our teeth and demonstrates this with a big prop representing the bacteria which he sticks to our volunteer.

He tells the audience that if we don’t clean our teeth the bacteria eats away at a tooth until it gets right down inside it and gives us toothache and that’s why we need to brush the plaque away. Using a giant tooth brush Mouldy demonstrates how we should brush, using little circular movements, and tells the audience we should do this twice a day.

The children learn the couplet: Don’t lose the war of tooth decay

Fight back that plaque, brush twice a day!

An interesting experiment, which illustrates tooth decay well, is to put a hard boiled egg in a cup of malt vinegar and to leave it for a day. When you come back to the egg part of the shell will have been eaten away and parallels can be drawn between the vinegar and the egg and what sweets and fizzy drinks do to our teeth.

Show Requirements

The actors will be arriving approximately forty minutes prior to the start time in order to set up and will need to have access to the school hall from then. They bring the set, lighting and sound equipment with them so only need access to a plug socket. They’ll need a space approximately 15’ wide by 10’ deep with the children sitting in front, either seated or on the floor. The show works well ‘on the flat’ but if it’s more convenient for them to use your stage, please let them know on arrival. Captain Cholesterol and the Grannies from Mars lasts one hour with a two minute q & a session at the end.