Conhecendo a alimentação saudável

Abstract

The aim of this work was to investigate the food habits of 46 students from the elementary school, aged between 11 and 12 years and from the more varied social classes. Through a questionnaire and guidelines with theoretical and practical lessons taught by the teacher and a nutritionist´s lecture, students were given instructions to improve their eating habits and also awareness of the importance of the type of food they are consuming, in addition to receiving knowledge about the importance of the function of each of them on the development of the organism. This study showed that many of the children already have a good knowledge on how to have a good diet but not all do practice these information. It can be noticed in this research that among the children surveyed, 43.47% have the minimum of the meals required (breakfast, lunch and dinner), another item that stands out is the time they spend to make their meal, where 65.21 % spend a period of 5 to 15 minutes, which is reasonable considering the current restlessness children present during a meal . With respect to the ingestion of liquids, it is possible to note that 39.13 % of the children have a good daily fluid intake, which allows replacement of what was lost during the activities of the body and hydration of the body as well. As for chewing, another relevant point, it was found that a very high number (46 %) of children eat with few chews (5-10 chews) and a very small number as 7 % of the students, feed properly performing over 30 chews. This fact directly interferes with digestion and consequently the utilization and absorption of nutrients available from food. However after activities it was observed that a large portion of the children surveyed already have a satisfactory amount of information about food and healthy eating, demonstrating that they mostly practice and realize the importance of proper use of food. This information is easily disseminated through the media, both for knowledge and for understanding as well as kids also have easy access to acquire this knowledge and many of them are practicing it , but not as a general rule. Thus the function of the school is to assist in the acquisition, understanding and awareness of a healthier diet provided with essential nutrients and to emphasize their importance to their well - being and development.