It makes me so angry that CICO etc. isn't taught in schools
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cwolfman13 wrote: »
That said, I do think most of this is going to come from parents and the examples they set. My wife and I like our kids to see us in workout clothes and going to and from the gym and a lot of our family time is spent outdoors on walks and bike riding and generally being active. We also eat pretty well and nutrition is important to us. I think the example we are setting is far more powerful than anything they could ever learn in a class room.
Well, exactly.
I mean what kid is going to reply to "Guess what, kids! McDickey Meals were only $5.50 supersized today...just like yesterday...here you go...it even comes with a toy and a FRESH BAKED apple pie rectangle" with, "No thanks, Mom, today we learned the intrinsic value of a stalk of broccoli"?
My parents always made sure I ate my veg and fruit when I was younger...and overall we ate pretty healthfully...but I was also very active and participated in sports year around and sometimes it just had to be about the calories...I think that's an important aspect of understanding health as well.
I remember my parents would always take me to this pancake house after track meets and football games, wrestling matches, etc...because they could spend $5 and get me all I could eat pancakes and I would mow down plates of those things...just needed the calories at that point. I actually had difficulty maintaining a healthy weight...I was slightly underweight most of my middle school and high school life and into young adulthood. So while it is important to understand the nutritional aspect of things, it's also important to understand energy and in the proper context a super-sized something or other isn't always a bad thing.0 -
nicsflyingcircus wrote: »If we're really serious about this, why not increase the amount of PE during the school week, put in performance standards for it, have quarterly body composition assessments and those not meeting acceptable standards get extra PE?
We're lucky. The kids get PE 45 minutes per day, every day of the week, right up until 6th grade. Then in 7th and 8th they get it two quarters/school year. High school they only have to take it once, unless they are on a school team.
The more school budgets are tied to standardized tests (Bipartisan BOO to NCLB and CC), the less time gets given to lifelong-learning style PE (not testing that privileges the already-athletic, but activities that make movement fun and sustainable) and science-based health and wellness ed. Add in political agendas like "abstinence only" and Agricultural subsidy-holders? And the basic science of keeping young bodies healthy, understood, and accepted? GONE.0 -
nicsflyingcircus wrote: »If we're really serious about this, why not increase the amount of PE during the school week, put in performance standards for it, have quarterly body composition assessments and those not meeting acceptable standards get extra PE?
We're lucky. The kids get PE 45 minutes per day, every day of the week, right up until 6th grade. Then in 7th and 8th they get it two quarters/school year. High school they only have to take it once, unless they are on a school team.
Our kids get PE daily too, and in addition to daily PE the elementary and middle school kids get recess, generally outdoors. If indoors, it's a physical activity indoors. So for ages about 5-13, there are two physical periods during the day; high school, one physical period per day.
Someone upthread said s/he electively did not take PE in high school...that blew my head...I can't imagine that. Gym was NOT an elective for us growing up and now, living all the way across the country, it isn't an elective for my kids either.
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cwolfman13 wrote: »cwolfman13 wrote: »
That said, I do think most of this is going to come from parents and the examples they set. My wife and I like our kids to see us in workout clothes and going to and from the gym and a lot of our family time is spent outdoors on walks and bike riding and generally being active. We also eat pretty well and nutrition is important to us. I think the example we are setting is far more powerful than anything they could ever learn in a class room.
Well, exactly.
I mean what kid is going to reply to "Guess what, kids! McDickey Meals were only $5.50 supersized today...just like yesterday...here you go...it even comes with a toy and a FRESH BAKED apple pie rectangle" with, "No thanks, Mom, today we learned the intrinsic value of a stalk of broccoli"?
My parents always made sure I ate my veg and fruit when I was younger...and overall we ate pretty healthfully...but I was also very active and participated in sports year around and sometimes it just had to be about the calories...I think that's an important aspect of understanding health as well.
I remember my parents would always take me to this pancake house after track meets and football games, wrestling matches, etc...because they could spend $5 and get me all I could eat pancakes and I would mow down plates of those things...just needed the calories at that point. I actually had difficulty maintaining a healthy weight...I was slightly underweight most of my middle school and high school life and into young adulthood. So while it is important to understand the nutritional aspect of things, it's also important to understand energy and in the proper context a super-sized something or other isn't always a bad thing.
My parents made me eat good meals too, but that was back in the dark ages, when "three square meals" was the rule of the day, you ate all your veggies or you did not leave the table, and nobody over the age of four (unless they had extremely physical extracurricular activities and came home dripping sweat) was expected to "need" a snack during the day, much less between two and five of them complete with a giant Capri Sun Supa Mega X-TREME Blast!!!!! pouch with each. When we were thirsty during the school day, we went to the water fountain. No, seriously. Water. The clear kind, without flavorings. Amazingly, just water kept us from becoming dehydrated and requiring a hospital visit with IV interference and three whole meals a day kept us from fainting dead away from hypoglycemic attacks (except for the very, very, very rare legitimately hypoglycemic kid).
Again: the parents made the rules. The parents made the kids eat well. We didn't NEED the schools to tell us, "If you sit on your a** all day and eat chips out of a bag, you'll get fat." We could see it for ourselves, and trust me, the overwhelming majority of us were nowhere near future rocket scientists.
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PE was required for 2 years in my high school, but was an elective after that (and I don't know anyone who elected it). (I was pretty active in high school, though--I cross country skiied and even after I decided I couldn't make varsity and quit I ran and rode my bike a lot recreationally.)0
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lemurcat12 wrote: »crazyjerseygirl wrote: »I think the reason why CICO isn't taught in schools is because giving a bunch of pre/teens the way to loose weight would be putting the school right on track to be sued for eating disorders.
Do schools get sued because someone got pregnant, because the school teaches sex ed? Bizarre argument.
Why make weight LOSS a focus? How about just...maintaining a healthy weight or simply understanding how gaining/losing/maintaining weight works?
They could present the healthy weight zones for people's age/height and how many calories it takes to maintain, to reach a certain weight, etc. And that a calorie is a calorie, but use this class to instruct on the RDA levels of nutrients and how to read labels and reach those goals....
Here's something some schools are doing and the response: http://www.parents.com/blogs/food-scoop/2013/09/04/diet/report-cards-about-your-kids-weight-good-or-bad-idea/
I remember learning about the 4 food groups too, but only vaguely. I can't remember at all if we discussed nutrition after elementary school, but we very well might have. I get the sense that more teaching about this stuff (MyPlate and all that) happens now, but it's so impossible to generalize about what happens in US schools.
In the '80s there were fitness standards for physical activity, I remember that.
The Presidential Fitness Test, where you had to do static arm hang and broad jump and shuttle run.0 -
Yes!
Was there a rope climb? I remember a rope climb (could have been for some other reason). I was good at it, but some kid fell off the rope and broke his leg and was in a wheelchair for some time. Can't believe the school didn't get sued (and perhaps it did).0 -
We had two 90 minute classes per week most of the time. I sucked at PE.0
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lemurcat12 wrote: »Yes!
Was there a rope climb? I remember a rope climb (could have been for some other reason). I was good at it, but some kid fell off the rope and broke his leg and was in a wheelchair for some time. Can't believe the school didn't get sued (and perhaps it did).
There was a rope climb. We had 2 ropes, one with knots, and one without, but the one with knots was so worn down, it might as well not have had them.0 -
Here's something on it: http://www.ihpra.org/First Fifty Years.pdf0
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lemurcat12 wrote: »Here's something on it: http://www.ihpra.org/First Fifty Years.pdf
Did your school have you work out to that Chicken Fat record, too?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFofqe26t-4 0 -
I hated PE in school except when we had 1 section that wasn't tied to a competitive sport - when the girls did aerobics, and I don't know what the boys did. I sucked at most of the activities in gym class as I had zero coordination, no grace, and no aim so I sucked at volley ball, tennis, golf, ping pong, softball, field hockey, basketball, soccer (broke my wrist playing soccer). I hated jogging around the gym or the track. I did like aerobics, and oddly enough, I liked indoor hockey as long as my job was to just keep people away from the goal and not deal with the puck itself..lol... and that was it. If we were required to do MORE PE I would have died.
When I took PE in college it was better - we could choose a class (like aerobics) for the semester, and we had to keep a weekly activity log that showed at least 2 hours of outside activity like walking, running, biking, etc. We also took a life fitness class and again...I don't remember much about the nutrition angle though I'm sure that was in there!
My kids now (going to the same school as me) get to go kayaking on the lake for a few class periods (the school is on the shore of the big lake here). They HATE It, and I am jealous. I told them I would have killed for something like that instead of golf. Seriously. LOL
Since most of PE was devoted to competitive sports, it was completely uninteresting to me. It would have been nicer had we had some other choices, but I know that public school has limitations. Now the school has fitness machines like my gym. I would have been more open to that kind of stuff than looking like a *kitten* with a soccer ball or striking out again with softball.0 -
stevencloser wrote: »We had two 90 minute classes per week most of the time. I sucked at PE.
I sucked at it too (and still am very uncoordinated to this day)...but we were expected, within our varying talent levels, from hero on down to zero, to at least move around a lot and give the day's lesson/game our best shot.
THAT was absolutely required and expected without question.
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lemurcat12 wrote: »Here's something on it: http://www.ihpra.org/First Fifty Years.pdf
Ha ha!
Overall I did horribly on the Presidential Physical Fitness Tests, but due to my nightly "calisthenics" routine, I did beat out the football captain at situps. He quit after 50, I kept going to 100.
I beat out the same guy at pushups, and they were "boy" pushups, full-down, full-up, not the girly modification ones with the bent knees. You'd think that poor boy would have learned.
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We still did the President's Fitness Test when I was in school (graduated high school in 2006) and PE was never optional. A lot of high schools in my area require 2 years of it, but mine did 4, block scheduled with our musicianship class. PE is where we sort of learned about nutrition, sex ed, and other health related items.
I sub now in this same district, and am routinely told by the classes that I'm in that they never get PE unless there is a sub. They get a 15 minute break recess and 20 minute lunch recess up until 7th grade (12 years old). I have yet to run into a nutrition unit that goes beyond identifying what group each food goes into, but they do take the Sesame Street approach of "sometimes" foods. FWIW, I'm in California.
As far as food prices are concerned, I live in the San Joaquin Valley area, so fresh produce is dirt cheap, especially in season, as long as you don't buy organic, although even that is reasonable compared so some of the other prices I've seen elsewhere, or from like Whole Foods.0 -
I had health class in school - 1 quarter of the year went to health class instead of gym every year. 4 years of gym/health was mandatory in high school. In health class we did first aid and cpr one year (we all got red cross certified - that was actually great), one year reproductive anatomy and health, not including sex, one year sex ed., one year was fitness and nutrition but it was weak, and we didn't learn about calories -they taught the old food pyramid, state standards, but even the teacher wasn't convinced. The irony of getting pulled out of gym class to learn nothing useful about fitness. I wish I had learned then that "healthy" foods can be calorific. I could wolf down a whole jar of olives thinking it was a good snack, after all it wasn't chips. My mother is extremely fit and healthy, always was, made a point of trying to teach me nutrition, but since she never had the need to pay attention to calories (very active), I never got that education. All I knew is that I was the only overweight family member. If we're all eating the same foods, why is that? (now I know - I love high calorie, nutritionally dense foods. never got the message that things like nuts are good for you, but you can't eat endless handfuls. always thought, well it's better to skip the chips and eat a bag of pecans instead). nope.
Problem is, nutrition can't be taught with the kind of nuance it needs in school, and Big Ag would end up controlling the message again, like with the food pyramid.
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I know what you mean! I'm pretty sure the information was skimmed over, IF SO. It was definitely not explained in a way it would have deserved to be.
I remember my mom trying to lose weight counting points on weight watchers, then when I started out trying to lose weight at 13-14 years old I remember deciding to ''eat healthy'' and I would ask my mom to make a ceaser salad, LOL. Good times, I was SO clueless.
Even when I started being interested in fitness and trying to make myself some diet plan off myfitnesspal, I still didn't fully understand CICO, or what REALLY meant BMR and TDEE. I was too focused on health, when what I was really after was weight loss. Am I glad I understand the simple principle of CICO now, I can use it to my advantage and I am not stressing about food anymore.
It also helped me understanding that there is no good or bad food, and also what moderation is. I also understand now how I will keep the weight off (eating at maintenance, determined by your TDEE). Such a relief!0 -
I really don't think it matters if healthy eating, portion control, or CICO is taught in schools. I was taught the merits of "healthy" eating often enough. It was taught to me for 3 years of health class, 2 years of home economics, and 8 years of physical education. These lessons were not enough to overcome what I learned by EXAMPLE.
It is one thing to learn about portion control in class. It is another thing to go home every day to brownies and cookies waiting for me as an after school snack. To have my dad constantly cook delicious meals that were so full of butter, oil, pasta, and cream sauces that in order to stay a normal weight I would have had to eat almost nothing in terms of volume. To see my entire immediate family - all males between 6'2"-6'4" - eat huge portions and not get fat, and never realizing that their height and gender forgave them in a way that my body never could.
NO amount of schooling could change what I observed. I would laugh off mentions of eating smaller portions because "My dad eats 3 times this much and he's not fat at all! I MUST be fat because of genetics or something, because I eat no more than the rest of my family."
Schools could teach nothing but healthy eating, and there would still be students who believe otherwise because of what they learn at home.0 -
ChipChocolatePancake wrote: »I really don't think it matters if healthy eating, portion control, or CICO is taught in schools. I was taught the merits of "healthy" eating often enough. It was taught to me for 3 years of health class, 2 years of home economics, and 8 years of physical education. These lessons were not enough to overcome what I learned by EXAMPLE.
It is one thing to learn about portion control in class. It is another thing to go home every day to brownies and cookies waiting for me as an after school snack. To have my dad constantly cook delicious meals that were so full of butter, oil, pasta, and cream sauces that in order to stay a normal weight I would have had to eat almost nothing in terms of volume. To see my entire immediate family - all males between 6'2"-6'4" - eat huge portions and not get fat, and never realizing that their height and gender forgave them in a way that my body never could.
NO amount of schooling could change what I observed. I would laugh off mentions of eating smaller portions because "My dad eats 3 times this much and he's not fat at all! I MUST be fat because of genetics or something, because I eat no more than the rest of my family."
Schools could teach nothing but healthy eating, and there would still be students who believe otherwise because of what they learn at home.
I know that family obviously plays a massive role in educating you and forming healthy eating habits. But surely the fact that some families reinforce healthy eating habits isn't a reason not to try to teach it at all? Otherwise it's not helping to end the cycle of misunderstanding.
You wouldn't say that it's not worth teaching all children about evolution because some of them go home to parents who are against it and argue a creationist theory, would you?
I don't know, I still think it's important. I think everyone should have access to that information.
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lemurcat12 wrote: »Here's something on it: http://www.ihpra.org/First Fifty Years.pdf
Did your school have you work out to that Chicken Fat record, too?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFofqe26t-4
I do not recall Chicken Fat but have heard older kids from my school reminiscing about it0
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