Formation of the ability to arrange a well-balanced diet : A plan for a "Dish-Nutrition" study

Abstract

Recently, the environment surrounding children's meals has changed. Therefore, children have had to develop the ability to arrange a well-balanced diet in their daily lives. In the past teaching of Home Economics, we improved this ability by meal planning lesson, which taught children the procedures of cooking by combining food effectively. Recently, however, some problems have developed. We planned a "Dish-Nutrition" study to develop students' ability to judge the nutritional balance in a way suitable to the actual situation of children's meals and their developmental stage. This study was made up of the terms which teach children the general amount of nutrition, which is through the dietary pattern of the staple food, the main dish, the side dish and the soup, keeping our eyes on the idea of "one dish," as they experience in their daily lives. We are now trying to give these lessons using computers in Junior High School. They will learn to recognize the nutritive value per dish by using the rate of sufficiency to the dietary allowance and evaluate the nutritional balance of their meals from the dishes' nutritive value.