Influence of Food Education on the quality of snacks of middle school children
Abstract Introduction The window of opportunity for the creation of eating behaviours and preferences, occurs during the early years, and will be reflected throughout the rest of their lives. The school represents an ideal environment to apply behavioural shaping strategies and to create eating habits, but can also be negatively affected by unbalanced eating behaviours. Cognitive performance is influenced by their diet, and a deficit of important nutrients harms school productivity, enhancing the importance of creating habits of making healthy, balanced and complete snacks. Objectives To evaluate the quality of middle school children snacks, and to comprehend the influence of Food Education on the improvement of this same quality Methodology Make a detailed initial registration of the snacks composition (morning and afternoon snacks), for 5 consecutive days. Then, apply lectures of Food Education throughout the school year, enhancing what is the ideal composition of these snacks. Repeat the registration of the school snacks, at the end of the year, in order to compare the data gathered before and after the Food Education qualification. Results Through comparing the initial and final registration, it’s possible to see differences in the quantity of some food groups: grain bread (4% to 7%), even though refined bread also increased (51% to 53%); plain milk (29% to 37%), in detriment to flavoured milk (10% to 4%); sugared cakes and cookies, with or without filling (23% to 6%); industrial pastry shop products (27% to 7%). Conclusion Based on the results gathered, it is possible to conclude that a continuous Food Education, focused on improving school snacks, led to a significant improvement of the nutritional quality of food choices, enhancing the importance and need of instruct children during their early school years, involving the environment of their everyday lives.