Brain Food | A Guide To Food For Better Learning

A Guide To Food For Better Learning

Teachers of many years experience have noticed a marked deterioration in health, behaviour and learning of pupils.

When asked what are the problems, teachers list that many children display the following characteristics, pointing out that these do not occur all the time in any one child and that each child will vary in the number, type and frequency of these.

Restlessness
Difficulty sitting still, fidgety, on the go the whole time, driven.

Impulsiveness
Easily distracted, interrupts or intrudes on others, unpredictable.

Inattentive
Fails to follow instruction, or complete work, disorganised, lacks focus.

Poor Coordination
Clumsy, writing at times large spidery or illegible, mixed left - right dominance.

Poor Mental Processing
Letter reversals, inconsistent spelling or maths, day dreams.

Antisocial Behaviour
Argumentative, aggressive, destructive, defiant, devious, swears, steals and lies.

Emotional Instability
Extremes of feelings, easily frustrated, overreacts to touch, pain, sound, weepy.

Health issues
Prone to infections, glue ear, eye puffiness or dark circles, allergies, asthma, eczema, hives, headaches, muscle or stomach pains, excessive thirst and perspiration.

And others, that were hardly seen in the past.

These children don't want to be ill, unhappy or not to learn and tiredness cannot account for the problem.

While teachers note the changes in pupils, health professionals note changes in disease patterns - large rises in diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancers and others.

Body size has increased so it is not lack of food - indeed the range and choice of food has increased enormously. But diet has significantly changed and also there has been an explosion in the number of chemicals unknown in the natural world that life is now exposed to.

What factors in the diet can have brought these changes in health, behaviour and learning?

Both body and brain need an adequate supply of nutrients to grow and function, and the brain particularly is especially chemically sensitive and easily disrupted.

There are two main factors:

1. Deficiency of nutrients in processed food.

2. Reaction to the number or amount of chemicals both artificial and natural