A children s story inspired by the Sask Sport game Cats and Rats Written by Jillian Eberts & Sara Lautenslager Photographs by Jillian Eberts
Note to Teachers, Parents and Caregivers Why health literacy? Health literacy is important because it provides children with the importance of physical activity. This narrative creates an enjoyable and motivating understanding and interpretation of early childhood development based on SaskSport s Cats and Rats game. The Battle of the Cheese focuses on involving participants in locomotion, movement, manipulation and social skills. Health literacy helps provide teachers, parents and caregivers with the ability to engage a group of children in physical activity in an enjoyable and fun way. Why this activity/game in this writing form? The goal of this narrative is to engage children in social interaction and team work amongst their peers, while developing locomotion, movement and manipulation skills. This narrative promotes problem solving and teamwork while trying to obtain the goal of capturing and maintaining the cheese. By reading this book, the importance of cohesion is highlighted and displayed as an important life skill that children can relate to and will develop throughout their life.
Sam, Molly and Matt were the meanest cats. The 3 cats preyed on 3 rats. They waited outside the rat hole, day and night, hoping the rats would come out. 1
2 Jacob and his 2 friends, Megan and Sara were the 3 rats who lived inside the hole in the wall. One day, the 3 rats became very hungry but did not have any cheese left. Jacob, Megan and Sara decided to come out of the hole to find the cheese.
The rats began searching for cheese. Jacob quickly noticed cheese in the corner on the floor. Jacob and Megan ran towards the cheese and Jacob grabbed it. 3
As Jacob took the cheese, Matt spotted him! 4
Matt showed Molly and Sam where the rats were. The 3 cats began running towards Jacob, Megan and Sara, hoping to catch them. 5
6 Jacob and Megan were very scared! They did not want the cats to catch them!
Jacob ran as fast as he could but Sam was getting closer and closer! She was so close to catching Jacob! 7
8 As Jacob ran, he noticed that Megan was close to the hole in the wall. He rolled the cheese to Megan so that the cats would not steal the cheese away from him.
Megan took the cheese and quickly ran into the hole. Megan was safe from the cats. 9
10 Matt, Megan and Molly became tired and began to slow down. Jacob and Sara were able to escape the cats and run back into their hole.
Jacob, Megan and Sara were finally safe from the cats! They were very happy because they did not get caught by the cats and they found the cheese. 11
12 Jacob worked up a big appetite. Finally, Jacob was able to enjoy the cheese and fill his stomach while the cats waited outside the hole for the rats to come out again.
Dedication We would like to dedicate this book to the students of École Centennial Community School in Regina, Saskatchewan. The students are seen in the graphics within the book. Without the help of Mrs. Leupold and her students. Kaitlyn, Mariah, Akeyan, Matthew and Kalena, this book would not be the same! 13
Battle of the Cheese : Joey and his friends went on an adventure to find cheese. The adventure turned into a battle when they began being chased by three cats. Joey and his friends had to use teamwork and physical activity skills to escape the cats. Sara Lautenslager was born and raised in Regina, Saskatchewan. She attended Winston Knoll Collegiate Highschool and now attends the University of Regina, studying in the Faculty of Kinesiology and Health Studies. Jillian Eberts was born and raised in Regina, Saskatchewan. She attends the University of Regina and majors in Human Kinetics in the Faculty of Kinesiology and Health Studies. This book was developed in partial fulfillment of KIN 180: Growth & Development Course at the University of Regina, 2013. Acknowledgements: SaskSport inspired this book based on their game Cats and Rats. This game can be located at http://www.sasksport.sk.ca/cis/pdf/manipulation_tag.pdf