Good nutrition helps students get to school prepared to learn. Because improvements in nutrition make students healthier, students are likely to have fewer absences and attend class more often. Studies show that malnutrition leads to behavioral problems and that sugar has a negative impact on children's behavior. However, these effects can be counteracted when children eat a balanced diet that includes proteins, fats, complex carbohydrates, and fiber.
Therefore, students will have more time in class and will have fewer interruptions in learning throughout the school year. In addition, student behavior can improve and cause fewer classroom interruptions, creating a better learning environment for each student in the class. Nutrition also plays an important role in school performance. Children who follow diets lacking in healthy fruits, vegetables and proteins tend to score lower on tests than their peers, and hunger can cause children to miss school or have to repeat grades.
When children have access to adequate nutrition and healthy food options, there is an overall increase in academic performance, but especially in mathematics and reading. The link between nutrition, development and academic performance is clear, and we know that access to adequate nutrition can be a challenge for children living in poverty. Schools and communities that focus on providing free, nutritious meals and snacks to all children can help level the playing field for children who don't have access to those foods outside of school. In addition, it's important to teach children and families about nutrition, but it's equally important not to take it for granted that all parents have the resources to provide nutritious food to their children and not judge parents who are unable to do so.
And since all problems are related to deep-seated systemic problems, such as poverty and food deserts, we can continue to work to address fundamental problems and work on policies and support companies that will work to completely eliminate food deserts. A great deal of research suggests that healthy nutrition dramatically improves children's cognitive function and measurable academic performance. Several studies show that nutritional status can directly affect the mental capacity of school-age children. .
Let's look at the relationship between lack of access to adequate nutrition and a child's performance in school. Nutrition standards for school meals are extremely important for the many children in the United States who rely on school meals as their only source of nutrition. Drewnowski and Specter state in an article published in the American Journal of Nutrition in January 2004 that limiting the intake of unhealthy foods is as important to children's cognition and school performance as eating lots of nutritious foods. The consumption of too many nutritionally deficient foods and beverages high in added fats, sugars and salt, such as candy, chips and fried foods, has been linked to emotional and behavioral problems in children and adolescents5. These two factors (rising costs and lack of access to healthy food) make it especially difficult for families living in poverty to provide children with the best nutrition.
Reddan and his colleagues reported in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior between January and February 2002 that schools with UFB programs reported having students with more energy and better attention than schools without those programs. While researchers are still working to definitively demonstrate the relationship, existing data suggests that, with better nutrition, students can learn better, students have fewer absences, and student behavior improves, leading to fewer classroom interruptions. In today's nutritional environment, many consumers are looking not only for foods and dietary supplements that improve physical health and well-being, but also foods “for the brain” that improve cognition, mental acuity and emotional well-being. They claim that the fastest period of brain development is the first few years of life and, therefore, nutrition during childhood can lay the foundation for lifelong brain function.
A lack of nutritional options and healthy diets can delay the mental and physical development of young children. The study, published in the Annals of Nutrition and Metabolism in February 2002, followed students for the six months prior to the start of the program until six months after their participation in the program. .
