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Feb. 1, 2008
Be careful with that sugar
Nutrition is one of the key elements to keeping children healthy.
ADAM GELMON
As a teacher, I spend most of the day with kids, and can truly appreciate how hard my students work, both in and out of the classroom. We ask a lot of our kids. They need to achieve academically, physically and socially from early in the morning until bedtime. Along with enough rest, they need highly nutritious food that will support their growing bodies and allow them to perform at their best. Too often, though, kids forgo healthy foods for those that are fatty, salty and almost always packed with sugar.
The provincial government has recently taken a step in the right direction with the ban of junk food sales in elementary schools. The reality, though, is that most junk food is not purchased at school, but rather hidden in breakfast foods and packed in kids' lunches.
Putting the long-term health effects of sugar aside, its day-to-day effects can be seen in classrooms and households across the country. Refined sugar intake can have profound effects on the way kids feel and perform; yet as a society, our diets are more sugary than ever.
The staple of North American breakfasts is cold cereal – a fiendish culprit within the average diet. Most cold breakfast cereals hardly amount to much more than bowlfuls of refined sugar with small doses of vitamins thrown in for good measure. Even breakfast cereal commercials make sure to emphasize that their cereals are only "part of a complete breakfast," which often includes three or four other foods. The reality though is that, most of the time, cereal is eaten by itself, with the half cup of milk that's poured on top providing much of the nutritional value.
The biggest short-term consequence of eating most breakfast cereals is that they cause a big spike in blood sugar and energy levels lasting a very short time, usually being followed by a crash in energy very soon after. These fluctuating energy levels can cause mood swings, as well as deficits in attention and classroom performance.
A brain-boosting breakfast should include a balance of protein and complex carbohydrates to support a more controlled release of energy and to get the brain jump-started in the morning. Skim milk, whole grains, yogurt and fruit are all good choices for breakfast. Smoothies can also be good for hesitant or time-pressed breakfast eaters.
A healthy balance of protein and carbohydrates is also important for the rest of the day's meals, and a healthy lunch will keep the brain firing on all cylinders until the last bell of the day. The B.C. Ministry of Education and the Community Nutritionists Council of British Columbia offer the following tips for packing healthy lunches:
• Try to include foods from each of the four food groups in Canada's Food Guide (vegetables and fruit, grain products, milk and alternatives and meat and alternatives).
• Kids love to eat what they create, so let your child choose from a healthy list of offerings to make his or her own lunch.
• Speed up the process by cutting extra veggies when you're preparing dinner or by making extra at meals to use as "re-runs" for lunches the following day.
• On a cold day, a small thermos of soup, pasta or other hot item can be satisfying.
• Freeze yogurt tubes and juice boxes. This will keep them cool until the time your child is ready to eat.
• A child's taste seems to change on a whim, so try new things regularly and don't be afraid to try them again and again. It can take many exposures to new foods before children learn to like them.
In addition to healthful foods, brains – especially young, active brains – need a constant supply of water. Hydration levels affect energy and, unfortunately, many students spend part or most of the day under-watered. Many students are just a gym class or recess away from being dehydrated and the best way to combat this is to keep a water bottle close at hand. That is, of course, assuming that the water bottle is used to contain water and not a sweetened substitute.
Much of the sugar in our children's diets is not chewed, but rather guzzled. Pop and juices contain hundreds of calories and, over the course of the day, children can easily take in their calories in liquid form. Highly sweetened juice and pop rarely contain much, if any, nutritional value and can also negatively affect energy levels, if not consumed with solid food.
For the little athletes in our lives, water seems to have taken a back seat to sports drinks that claim to enhance physical performance. In fact, sports drinks are rarely a better substitute for water. Most sports drinks are overly sweetened and contain artificial colors and other additives. Stick with plain, cold water or flavor the water with a small amount of juice or slices of lemon.
The dietary lessons and habits we learn as children impact us for the rest of our lives, so, while I don't want to imagine a childhood that's sugar-free, sweetness, as with almost everything, is best in balance.
Adam Gelmon is a teacher at Vancouver Talmud Torah school who is currently completing his master's degree in education. He can be reached at [email protected].
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