It makes me so angry that CICO etc. isn't taught in schools
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Erm, it is. Several times. I also remember we had a 'mock' set up where we would roughly calculate our PE and our daily food intake.
The information is out there, I think the problem is that NEW SHINY FAD OMIGERDLOOKITSASHAKE stuff comes out and zombie mode turns on and we forget the basics.
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UK Here - England, Berks.
Got the food pyramid in Reception. At least once a year we'd talk about nutrition in PSHE classes up to year 6 when they talked about nutrition, calories and what a calorie is in Biology. We also did some bunson burner experiments to demonstrate calorie measurements in Year 6 Physics.
Had at least yearly PSHE sessions on eating disorders (over and under eating) and how to regulate the amount you're eating through calories from Year 8 upwards (age 13+ so it was a bit more appropriate). Plus another mention of nutrition in the run up to GCSE (Years 10 and 11 - age 14-16).
I went to several different schools in England as we moved around a lot and this was pretty standard plus part of the curriculum from what I understand. I was at school within the last 10 years though so maybe it's not where you went to school but when?
Also - despite the education, still felt the need to cut everything out to lose weight before a stern nurse at the NHS told me to just eat a balanced diet. Oh, and on the NHS, have you forgotten the Change 4 Life initiative that's been running for the last few years with adverts on telly every few months? http://www.nhs.uk/change4life/pages/be-food-smart.aspx
The education is there! It's just getting people to listen that's the problem!
ETA: Yup, part of the curriculum: http://www.nutrition.org.uk/foodinschools/curriculum/the-curriculum.html
What the hell is PSHE class?
We never learnt about health & fitness at my school, no health classes (80s-90s by the way). We may have had the food pyramid at the start of school but never cico, fitness etc0 -
I'm a school teacher and it makes ME mad that this sort of thing isn't taught by parents at home...0
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I remember Health classes and the food pyramid and Physical Education (70's - 80"s). Did that help my mother when planning our meals especially all the country cooking I consumed as a child? And did this help her with weighing food or portion control? NOPE..
I ate what was given to me..
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DawnieB1977 wrote: »DawnieB1977 wrote: »Lrdoflamancha wrote: »JenniDaisy wrote: »If you can't get some schools to teach sex ed or the theory of evolution, I don't think you're going to get them to teach kids how to nourish their bodies properly.
Maybe because it is the theory of evolution... Not the fact of evolution...
Anyway, that's faith schools. I'm sure it's not against any religion to talk about eating and exercise.
Nope. True story - one of our biology teachers refused to teach the evolution section of the S grades and Highers. She was also one of the RE teachers O.o
(they did get another teacher in, didn't just skip it (as in the case of the above poster XD))
I know Catholic schools don't like kids to know anything except God created us! Plus of course their teaching of sex ed can depend on how strict a school it is. However, I'm sure Catholics believe in healthy eating and exercise
Nope. I went through 12 years of a Catholic education and I learned about the theory of evolution and an old earth and everything scientific. And this was back in the 60's and 70's.
We did get sex ed. Of course on the issue of birth control? That was bad. I have a funny story about that. I flustered the nun with so many logic and biblical questions on the issue that she had to call in the male principal who had to go into an advanced theological explanation for the church's stance on the position on it.
You're thinking of Christian schools. Different animal.
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mamapeach910 wrote: »DawnieB1977 wrote: »DawnieB1977 wrote: »Lrdoflamancha wrote: »JenniDaisy wrote: »If you can't get some schools to teach sex ed or the theory of evolution, I don't think you're going to get them to teach kids how to nourish their bodies properly.
Maybe because it is the theory of evolution... Not the fact of evolution...
Anyway, that's faith schools. I'm sure it's not against any religion to talk about eating and exercise.
Nope. True story - one of our biology teachers refused to teach the evolution section of the S grades and Highers. She was also one of the RE teachers O.o
(they did get another teacher in, didn't just skip it (as in the case of the above poster XD))
I know Catholic schools don't like kids to know anything except God created us! Plus of course their teaching of sex ed can depend on how strict a school it is. However, I'm sure Catholics believe in healthy eating and exercise
Nope. I went through 12 years of a Catholic education and I learned about the theory of evolution and an old earth and everything scientific. And this was back in the 60's and 70's.
We did get sex ed. Of course on the issue of birth control? That was bad. I have a funny story about that. I flustered the nun with so many logic and biblical questions on the issue that she had to call in the male principal who had to go into an advanced theological explanation for the church's stance on the position on it.
You're thinking of Christian schools. Different animal.
Nope. My friend works in the local catholic school, and I did a teaching placement there.
This is in England.0 -
UK Here - England, Berks.
Got the food pyramid in Reception. At least once a year we'd talk about nutrition in PSHE classes up to year 6 when they talked about nutrition, calories and what a calorie is in Biology. We also did some bunson burner experiments to demonstrate calorie measurements in Year 6 Physics.
Had at least yearly PSHE sessions on eating disorders (over and under eating) and how to regulate the amount you're eating through calories from Year 8 upwards (age 13+ so it was a bit more appropriate). Plus another mention of nutrition in the run up to GCSE (Years 10 and 11 - age 14-16).
I went to several different schools in England as we moved around a lot and this was pretty standard plus part of the curriculum from what I understand. I was at school within the last 10 years though so maybe it's not where you went to school but when?
Also - despite the education, still felt the need to cut everything out to lose weight before a stern nurse at the NHS told me to just eat a balanced diet. Oh, and on the NHS, have you forgotten the Change 4 Life initiative that's been running for the last few years with adverts on telly every few months? http://www.nhs.uk/change4life/pages/be-food-smart.aspx
The education is there! It's just getting people to listen that's the problem!
ETA: Yup, part of the curriculum: http://www.nutrition.org.uk/foodinschools/curriculum/the-curriculum.html
What the hell is PSHE class?
We never learnt about health & fitness at my school, no health classes (80s-90s by the way). We may have had the food pyramid at the start of school but never cico, fitness etc
Personal Social and Health Education. Sometimes we call it PHCSE (any combination of letters lol) and the C stands for Citizenship.0 -
DawnieB1977 wrote: »mamapeach910 wrote: »DawnieB1977 wrote: »DawnieB1977 wrote: »Lrdoflamancha wrote: »JenniDaisy wrote: »If you can't get some schools to teach sex ed or the theory of evolution, I don't think you're going to get them to teach kids how to nourish their bodies properly.
Maybe because it is the theory of evolution... Not the fact of evolution...
Anyway, that's faith schools. I'm sure it's not against any religion to talk about eating and exercise.
Nope. True story - one of our biology teachers refused to teach the evolution section of the S grades and Highers. She was also one of the RE teachers O.o
(they did get another teacher in, didn't just skip it (as in the case of the above poster XD))
I know Catholic schools don't like kids to know anything except God created us! Plus of course their teaching of sex ed can depend on how strict a school it is. However, I'm sure Catholics believe in healthy eating and exercise
Nope. I went through 12 years of a Catholic education and I learned about the theory of evolution and an old earth and everything scientific. And this was back in the 60's and 70's.
We did get sex ed. Of course on the issue of birth control? That was bad. I have a funny story about that. I flustered the nun with so many logic and biblical questions on the issue that she had to call in the male principal who had to go into an advanced theological explanation for the church's stance on the position on it.
You're thinking of Christian schools. Different animal.
Nope. My friend works in the local catholic school, and I did a teaching placement there.
This is in England.
Well, sorry, I think you're confusing that ultimately God is behind it all with how the Church's official stance.
Bear in mind that the big bang and creationism in Catholicism are not mutually exclusive.
They're pretty hand's off on the whole thing.
Wikipedia is sometimes dodgy source, but this article cites papal stuff, so I'll leave it here since that's pretty universal.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_and_evolution
I have no horse in this race, I'm pretty much a heathen at this point in my life, but frankly, I just don't believe you.
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I think they're a bit more progressive now, but seriously, Catholic schools have some funny ideas here. They allow the school nurse to talk about contraception I think, but not the teachers.0
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As a parent of a very bright teenager, I will say that my teen tends to believe things more if taught by a teacher or somwthing he reads online from a trusted spurce or a book than either of his parents. I don't think parents should replace teavhing facts about calories, about saving money, and about techology. Parents should be in addition to back up the facts they are taught but it should also be taught in schools.Umm yeah, it is. We teach about physical, social and emotional health actually.
*mini rant moment*
Why do schools have more and more responsibility chucked at them?! Is it too much to ask parents to parent?!
*rant over over*
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Kids in the UK are taught about healthy eating but then they go home and parents often don't support this. It's the parents that buy everything in the cupboards. We should all be stronger for our kids. I say this as a guilty parent. When I look back I could have done far more to promote healthy eating in my home.
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That said my son is a vegetarian (by choice at this piont ) and understands calories. He even tells his friends that being a vegetarian is not a magic bullet.
Also we all must be honest what is or isn't taught in school is heavily influenced by lobbists who spend a ton of time pressuring local, state, and federal governments to include or not include things. That was well documented on the food pyramid. Also schools are often underfunded which means that coke, pepsi, and fastfood have signed contracts to have themselves on campus (not just colleges) so even when we teach them something in class when they walk in the hall they get a VERY different message. Which creates an attitude of there are the facts and then there is what people actually do. Kids are smart and that is what they pick up on.
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lisafrancis888 wrote: »Kids in the UK are taught about healthy eating but then they go home and parents often don't support this. It's the parents that buy everything in the cupboards. We should all be stronger for our kids. I say this as a guilty parent. When I look back I could have done far more to promote healthy eating in my home.
This is not just the UK.
This goes back to what I said.. I learned a lot in school but my mother shopped for all the groceries, prepared all the food and cooked all the food.. that education in school was useless .. my mother should have attended Health and PE classes with me..
It does start at home...0 -
noobletmcnugget wrote: »It only takes a few minutes of skimming this forum or doing a few google searches to see that there is an absolutely RIDICULOUS amount of misinformation out there concerning weight loss. There're hundreds of fad diets and weight loss myths out there. In a lot of cases they end up putting people off trying to lose weight (because it seems like this impossible task) or results in people developing disordered eating patterns. It's so damaging physically, mentally and emotionally for so many people.
It makes me angry that we aren't all taught the basics about weight regulation, nutrition and fitness as children. The reality of it (which basically boils down to CICO) makes it so much simpler, sustainable and manageable than all these fad diets make it out to be... and people will actually get the results they're looking for.
Ugh it just annoys me because I know so many people who have struggled with their weight for so long because they weren't properly informed.
Rant over.
I teach it. In fact I showed the kids MFP. They're secondary school and had no idea how many calories were in anything or how many they should eat to maintain wait and be healthy.0 -
I'm from the US- East Coast and we had Health and Nutrition class in Middle and High school. We also had gym. I wasn't interested in it. I suffered from what most teenagers suffer from- apathy and an under-developed brain that led me and every other teenager to believe we are sort of invincible.
My parents, although thin and fairly good physical shape kept quite a bit of junk food in the house and gave us pretty much an all access pass to soda. They were also hardcore smokers, so that probably cut down on their actual appetite and explains how they stayed relatively thin- they just weren't eating as much while I was eating it and was obese at a young age.
Now that I care, and now I'm older armed with more information- I do not intend to make the same mistakes in my home with my son. This doesn't mean I've banned sugar from the house, but now I know way more about portion sizes, moderation, and physical activity/fitness. I don't allow soda or juice in the house though! haha
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DawnieB1977 wrote: »DawnieB1977 wrote: »Lrdoflamancha wrote: »JenniDaisy wrote: »If you can't get some schools to teach sex ed or the theory of evolution, I don't think you're going to get them to teach kids how to nourish their bodies properly.
Maybe because it is the theory of evolution... Not the fact of evolution...
Anyway, that's faith schools. I'm sure it's not against any religion to talk about eating and exercise.
Nope. True story - one of our biology teachers refused to teach the evolution section of the S grades and Highers. She was also one of the RE teachers O.o
(they did get another teacher in, didn't just skip it (as in the case of the above poster XD))
I know Catholic schools don't like kids to know anything except God created us! Plus of course their teaching of sex ed can depend on how strict a school it is. However, I'm sure Catholics believe in healthy eating and exercise
Catholic schools around here have zero problems with teaching evolution.0 -
DawnieB1977 wrote: »noobletmcnugget wrote: »noobletmcnugget wrote: »Lrdoflamancha wrote: »JenniDaisy wrote: »If you can't get some schools to teach sex ed or the theory of evolution, I don't think you're going to get them to teach kids how to nourish their bodies properly.
Maybe because it is the theory of evolution... Not the fact of evolution...
oh my god please tell me you didn't just say that
Dude, I told you - this is a country that passed a federal law declaring pizza a vegetable - what did you expect?
hahaha oh god I thought that was a joke
*sheds a tear*
EDIT: they're basing it on the fact it has tomato sauce right? Surely then it should be a fruit
I watched 'Fed Up' and learned this fact. Shocked at the school lunches in the US and thanking my lucky stars I'm English
Public schools in the US are locally-run, so they vary a lot. There are plenty of things wrong with my local school system, but the meals (breakfast and lunch) seem fine, even if there is an effort to make the child-friendly. I suppose I should watch Fed Up to see what's being claimed.0 -
cincysweetheart wrote: »Umm yeah, it is. We teach about physical, social and emotional health actually.
*mini rant moment*
Why do schools have more and more responsibility chucked at them?! Is it too much to ask parents to parent?!
*rant over over*
I get confused/frustrated by people who say they have no idea how to eat healthy… I often wonder about what kind of school they went to. I remember being taught about basic nutrition and a "balanced diet" in school, but I don't ever remember being taught about CICO in terms of weight management.
However… I had a wonderful mother who also taught me all about that stuff. And I realize that a vast majority of my "education" came from my mother. I didn't follow her advice very well as I grew up… But I always had the information. So once, I made the choice… I already knew what I needed to do.
+1
I actually don't believe for a second that the issue is that anyone doesn't know how to eat healthy. It's not that complicated. I think it's that people want to eat in a certain way, maybe don't know how to cook, and mostly it's just an excuse. People can figure out that eating some protein and veggies and perhaps some fruit and limiting sweets and fried foods and fast food and the like are ways to improve their diets. They just don't want to do those things, so saying they don't know what to do provides a good way to dismiss the idea that they could take responsibility.
And of course lots of people are tired and stressed and have reasons not to want to deal and eliminate what they see as a small pleasure, probably.0 -
I think a lot of people fall for marketing and articles in Women's World and what they hear / see on TV. There is no one single source of trustworthy info that EVERYONE will believe.
Eggs are bad. Eggs are good. High fructose corn syrup is bad sugar is good. Sugar is bad. Bacon is bad bacon is good. Caffeine is bad caffeine is good. Go organic. You can't trust that organic label. Avoid GMOs. There's nothing wrong with GMOs....don't drink alcohol..you need to cleanse and detox
...no you don't and alcohol is okay. Go vegan! Go paleo! Go Patriots!
So many articles and studies financed by special interest groups or pushed by slick marketing and the New York Times Best Seller list.
People are bombarded with conflicting messages all around...and I for one am tired of it....lol
Just had a quick conversation the other day with someone who of course is trying to stay away from "bad food." Who decides what's bad? Every where you turn there it's conflicting info.
People don't know who to believe. Is it any wonder there is confusion?0 -
noobletmcnugget wrote: »It only takes a few minutes of skimming this forum or doing a few google searches to see that there is an absolutely RIDICULOUS amount of misinformation out there concerning weight loss. There're hundreds of fad diets and weight loss myths out there. In a lot of cases they end up putting people off trying to lose weight (because it seems like this impossible task) or results in people developing disordered eating patterns. It's so damaging physically, mentally and emotionally for so many people.
It makes me angry that we aren't all taught the basics about weight regulation, nutrition and fitness as children. The reality of it (which basically boils down to CICO) makes it so much simpler, sustainable and manageable than all these fad diets make it out to be... and people will actually get the results they're looking for.
Ugh it just annoys me because I know so many people who have struggled with their weight for so long because they weren't properly informed.
Rant over.
I have not read everybody's post so I will just respond to the OP. You are completely right. I am absolutely terrible at maths (could never understand or needed to use Trigonometry or Phyphagourous), but I find the concept of calorie counting and fitting macros in to a daily budget really easy. I can just look at food now and guess pretty accurately cals, protein, carbs content etc. I don't need to weigh food, log it or check the nutritional content (for the most part) because I have been aware of this for so long that it is now easy. I had to learn all of this for myself though (even though I have never had a weight problem).0 -
I went to Catholic school grades K-12. Did sex ed, health eduction (where nutrition was taught), biology, evolution, etc. And that was quite a few years ago
My kids are now going to catholic school as well, and again they have health education classes where nutrition is taught daily, sex ed classes when they get to the correct grades, etc.
Basically nutrition is taught in schools, can't speak for every school, but in the provinces I've lived in in Canada, it is.0 -
Umm yeah, it is. We teach about physical, social and emotional health actually.
*mini rant moment*
Why do schools have more and more responsibility chucked at them?! Is it too much to ask parents to parent?!
*rant over over*
Too TRUE!!!!!
One of the many reasons I am taking early retirement this year.0 -
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.0
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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.
So, you think that giving young adults the correct information on diet and exercise would make them abuse the truth? Well, I'm afraid the truth is what it is, and what you do with that truth is more influenced by media and parental influences. I very much doubt the bulk of teenagers would abuse this information. Especially if they were taught about TDEE and BMR.
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HappyCampr1 wrote: »lemurcat12 wrote: »cincysweetheart wrote: »Umm yeah, it is. We teach about physical, social and emotional health actually.
*mini rant moment*
Why do schools have more and more responsibility chucked at them?! Is it too much to ask parents to parent?!
*rant over over*
I get confused/frustrated by people who say they have no idea how to eat healthy… I often wonder about what kind of school they went to. I remember being taught about basic nutrition and a "balanced diet" in school, but I don't ever remember being taught about CICO in terms of weight management.
However… I had a wonderful mother who also taught me all about that stuff. And I realize that a vast majority of my "education" came from my mother. I didn't follow her advice very well as I grew up… But I always had the information. So once, I made the choice… I already knew what I needed to do.
+1
I actually don't believe for a second that the issue is that anyone doesn't know how to eat healthy. It's not that complicated. I think it's that people want to eat in a certain way, maybe don't know how to cook, and mostly it's just an excuse. People can figure out that eating some protein and veggies and perhaps some fruit and limiting sweets and fried foods and fast food and the like are ways to improve their diets. They just don't want to do those things, so saying they don't know what to do provides a good way to dismiss the idea that they could take responsibility.
And of course lots of people are tired and stressed and have reasons not to want to deal and eliminate what they see as a small pleasure, probably.
There are others like me who never ate poorly to begin with. We just ate too much. There is a huge difference between cooking and knowing what to eat for health and keeping an eye on quantities.
Calorie amounts and counting was a revelation to me... something I'd always considered that only obsessive, sad people did. It's the stigma of counting that we need to get rid of. That stigma would be eased by publicly hearing about calore counting as a weight management tool. Whether that happens in school, magazines, public service announcements...i don't think it matters. It would just be nice to have the information more widely known and accepted as a given that this is how it's done.
Oh, I totally agree with this. Same for me, and I had no idea how many calories I was eating and found understanding about calories and how it was basically just a math problem to be empowering and to strip away the dumb emotional/shame stuff in a way that all the myths that get put out there do not.
I wasn't arguing that that's a bad thing to understand, just addressing the side point about whether people were ignorant (really) about how to eat well.
There ARE tons of confusing mixed messages that I think get people feeling like they might as well throw up their hands--carbs are bad, fat is bad, Americans get too much protein, no too little!, meat is good or bad, eggs, dairy, etc., as wizzybeth said. But, aside from all that, I think the basics of how to eat better (for those for whom that's the issue) are pretty simple. People who actually are eating no veggies (but fried potatoes) or tons of fast food (not the salads), or ridiculous amounts of high calorie sweets know this and know it's not ideal. They aren't idiots.0 -
onehappypickle 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.
So, you think that giving young adults the correct information on diet and exercise would make them abuse the truth? Well, I'm afraid the truth is what it is, and what you do with that truth is more influenced by media and parental influences. I very much doubt the bulk of teenagers would abuse this information. Especially if they were taught about TDEE and BMR.
Doesn't need to be the bulk, just one with sue happy parents.0 -
DawnieB1977 wrote: »UK Here - England, Berks.
Got the food pyramid in Reception. At least once a year we'd talk about nutrition in PSHE classes up to year 6 when they talked about nutrition, calories and what a calorie is in Biology. We also did some bunson burner experiments to demonstrate calorie measurements in Year 6 Physics.
Had at least yearly PSHE sessions on eating disorders (over and under eating) and how to regulate the amount you're eating through calories from Year 8 upwards (age 13+ so it was a bit more appropriate). Plus another mention of nutrition in the run up to GCSE (Years 10 and 11 - age 14-16).
I went to several different schools in England as we moved around a lot and this was pretty standard plus part of the curriculum from what I understand. I was at school within the last 10 years though so maybe it's not where you went to school but when?
Also - despite the education, still felt the need to cut everything out to lose weight before a stern nurse at the NHS told me to just eat a balanced diet. Oh, and on the NHS, have you forgotten the Change 4 Life initiative that's been running for the last few years with adverts on telly every few months? http://www.nhs.uk/change4life/pages/be-food-smart.aspx
The education is there! It's just getting people to listen that's the problem!
ETA: Yup, part of the curriculum: http://www.nutrition.org.uk/foodinschools/curriculum/the-curriculum.html
What the hell is PSHE class?
We never learnt about health & fitness at my school, no health classes (80s-90s by the way). We may have had the food pyramid at the start of school but never cico, fitness etc
Personal Social and Health Education. Sometimes we call it PHCSE (any combination of letters lol) and the C stands for Citizenship.
wow schools have changed since my days
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Well if they did that then the students and their parents would realize that the school lunches are total garbage and would be up in arms.0
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I can't imagine two parents agreeing on (and not screaming about) "healthy" food guidelines, much less an entire school full of them. I don't blame schools for only touching on food health topics briefly. They don't want to get sued for recommending "healthy nuts" and having a nut-allergy child require his Epipen during class. Or get sued for recommending poultry as a healthy protein source to vegetarians...for cooking "lean" pork during home ec (if they even still had it) and the Jewish students' parents freaking out...serving whole wheat bread to the gluten-intolerant...and on, and on, and on.
We were taught the Four Basic Food Groups. I believe it changed to the Food Pyramid some time during high school, but I don't really remember that clearly. One thing we DID know was that if you ate too much food, you got fat. It really was that simple. Go figure.0 -
In small town Iowa, USA we had health class that pretty accurately covered the current understanding of nutrition.
I don't think schools are the problem. As long as we have a free market with billions of dollars to be made from dieting loads of misinformation will be out there. It is fueled by droves of people looking for a quick fix for a long term problem. I don't see it changing.
Also, I don't think most children care much about the information so it isn't likely to be retained. Kids remember what is interesting or things that are frequently used and at that time most don't watch calories. Only as adults do most of us start to really care and by that time the information available is muddied by massive quantities of fad diets and wishful thinking.0
This discussion has been closed.
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