Back to School

Back to School

It is Back to School time already! The school supplies, the new shoes, and the clothes to wear—these are our main areas of focus when we think of back to school. But maybe this year can be different. Eating right and exercising daily is not only good for our children’s health and well-being it also affects their ability to learn.

Daily Exercise

Learning requires good nutrition and exercise

It is a known fact that daily exercise helps us with so much more than our physical body. Daily exercise helps with our stress levels, feelings of well-being, and clearing our minds of the day’s events. Our children need to have daily exercise. 

During the summer this is usually an easy thing to have happen. However, as soon as the school books open and the snow begins to fall, it can be all too easy to forget about how much exercise children need. Consider getting them involved in local children activity groups, school sports, off school sports, whatever your family can think of—the sky is the limit.

Some people think it is expensive to be involved in all of the activities and some are expensive, but you can also make money and get exercise. My two oldest grandsons work mowing lawns and herding chickens. They get an amazing amount of exercise and paid! Gardening can also bring financial results while teaching science and providing daily exercise. On top of all this they are involved with their church sports teams and more.  

Daily Nutrition

Be sure when you are sending your kids off to school this year that you truly understand nutrition and make choices that will help your children stay focused throughout the day. A lot of people have what I call a carbohydrate rich breakfast—cereal. More than likely you are not getting enough protein and dietary fat in the morning when they start the day. Consider getting up 5 minutes early and make eggs for breakfast! That’s all it takes to make an egg based breakfast—five minutes!

Lunch time has its challenges as well. Some kids have school lunches and others have school cafeterias or restaurant. There are so many choices and no supervision. Teaching kids why and how to choose wisely is important! Learn what you can about nutrients like dietary fat, protein, and carbohydrates. Each of them have their place in your child’s daily diet. I use the word diet as it is defined in Merriam Webster, “habitual nourishment.” Our kids need habitual nourishment in order to grow and learn.

Snacks are another area that we need to think about what is best for our kids. A well-balanced snack is a great segue to a good dinner. Try something like apples and peanut butter or mini tunafish salad sandwiches or fruit and cheese cubes.   

This School Year

So this year when we are all concerned about our back to school plans make sure that nutrition and exercise is a major part of back to school planning.

The US Government and the NFL have websites to help with ideas on nutrition and how to get 60 minutes of daily exercise for children into each day.  www.fueluptoplay60.com and www.letsmove.gov

Sherri Sue Fisher, author of TimerDiet and TimerOrganizer

Check blog.TimerOrganizer.com next week for Back to School ideas for organization

Beware of the 100 Calorie Snacks



100 Calorie Snack?!

Beware of the 100 Calorie Snacks

There has been a lot of talk about 100 calorie snacks being the go to amount to look for when picking out a snack. I use the word snack lightly, since most people think of snack as a cookie, or a candy bar, or if trying to eat healthy perhaps some celery and carrot sticks. But, none of these options are going to give you the nutrients that you need to get you through to the next meal (except perhaps the candy bar if they have a lot of nuts!) and help you in your ability to either sustain or lose weight. But, for now let’s focus on how you feel when you eat certain foods rather than the calories.

Use Your Own Body as a Guiney Pig (for a short time period)

I recommend using your body as a Guiney pig for a short time and really find out how your body feels when you are not eating a well-balanced meal or mini-meal (my name for snack). Well-balanced means that you are including dietary fat, protein, and carbohydrates and significant portions of each. Write down how you feel right after you eat, an hour after you eat, and then two hours after you eat. Try eating something well-balanced and do the same. How do you feel? Once you realize that you can affect how you feel by what you eat, you will look at food in a completely different way.

Why the desire or need for the 100 calorie snack?

I do not like the word snack, but for this paragraph I will use it. Sometimes you do need a little something to tide you over to the next scheduled meal. Especially if the next meal is a planned one with others or at a specified time dictated by your schedule. While 100 calories seems like a small amount and something to strive for, but as I pointed out in last week’s blog, calories are nothing more than a calculation of the nutrients of dietary fat, protein, and carbohydrates, and in and of itself are meaningless. 

Yes, calories in and of themselves are meaningless!

You do not need to eat a snack if you don’t feel like it and you also should not deprive yourself of snack if you need one. I read just yesterday that now the morning snack can lead to overeating during the day…hogwash! If you wake up early in the morning and your next meal is not going to be for 6 hours because you need to eat lunch at noon, you more than likely need a morning snack. But, if you wake up later in the morning and there is less than 4 hours between breakfast and lunch you probably don’t need one. Same applies for the afternoon, if you eat lunch at noon and dinner at 5pm, you are probably fine without an afternoon snack.

But, again it is all about when you feel you need to eat, not when someone else tells you that you need to eat. Track your progress using my journals either online or using the Apps in the Apple or Android Market – Timerdiet and you will learn how much and how often your body needs to eat and remember every day is different!

 

Sherri Sue Fisher, author of TimerDiet

www.timerdiet.com/journal