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Erika Toda
Eng 1010 D
Essay #4
Sean George
Dec 12 2014
Nutritional Education
A lot of countries are serving lunch at the school. They are considering
school meals as an education that how to eat healthy through having lunch
with friends and teacher. I am from Japan and I have had 11 years of
education in Japan, and I came to the states when I was in my senior year
of high school. Consequently, I saw both Japan and the states’ meal at the school and there are a
lot of differences between both countries. In Japan, all students have to pay around 40 dollars per
a month for the lunch. Basically Japanese school meals are rice, soup, meat or fish as a main dish
and vegetables on the side and glass of milk will come with the meal. On the other hand, I had
slice of the pizza, hamburger, or nuggets as a lunch in the states. Those food make me full
because of the big portion of the meal, but there are no nutrition and
unhealthy. Compare two countries, students eat healthy and balanced
lunch with meat and vegetables at school in Japan, and students don’t
get any vegetable from school lunch in the states. 2011, Michelle
Obama announced school lunch program. It is good idea to reduce
obesity rate of American
children. However, on the demonstration, it didn’t succeed. There are the reasons and ideas that
program can succeed.
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A lot of the developed countries serve lunch at the school. There are differences between
the countries, but they are well nutrition. On this paper, looking up the pictures of Spain,
Finland, South Korea and France’s school meal to discuss what is lack in the United States
school meal. Those school meals are unique by countries authentic local food. Furthermore, all
of the meal have some meat or fish, vegetables, and bread or rice. Those are really balanced and
healthy and they consider what kind of food children like, so children eat them without throwing
away those foods. Also those are not like what I ate in the state’s high school even there are
some food that similar to American lunch, there are some vegetable or fruits next to it to make
healthy meal. Those are summary of the meal from each country. First school lunches from
Spain, there are Tomato fusilli, deep fried fish, salad, bread, and an apple. Second, In Finland’s
meal is Salad, chicken curry and pudding, string beans and carrots, served with milk. In Korea,
they serves Korean pancake call tizimi, kimchi, doenjang stew (miso soup) served with rice and
a side of grapes. Finally, in France they serve fries and chicken nuggets with broccoli, bread,
pasta salad, and a slice of cake.
February 2010, Michelle Obama announced the “Let’s move!” project components of
The Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act (HHFK). December 2 2010, this movement became into the
law to improve children’s nutrition to healthier and reduce rate of child obesity.
“Today is a great day for kids throughout our country as they will soon have healthier,
and more nutritious food in their schools. As we continue to focus on the twin issues of
childhood obesity and hunger, we will increase access to good, quality meals in school
cafeterias so the nutritional needs of our youngsters are better met. The President and
First Lady have advocated strongly for passing the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of
2010, and, this bill, along with the resources and the powers provided under it, are going
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to allow USDA to be much more effective and aggressive in responding to obesity and
hunger challenges for America’s kids.”
Rates of the child obesity is really high in the United States and also rates of the child obesity
tripled over last three decades. The reason that tripled rate of the obesity is changing lifestyle.
First reason is less exercise because of the safety and developed technology. Children used to
walk to school, playing at the park, and having PE class and after school sports club, but they
cannot do it anymore because of the safety issue they replaced with car and bus, and technology
development make children stay at home play video game and watch TV. Moreover, school cut
off PE classes and after school sports club because they want to focus on the study. Second
reason is parents became busier. Children were used to eat one snack during the day, but
nowadays they eat three times in a day because the dinner time get later. Furthermore, meals
used be home cooked and there were some vegetables on the plates, and they rarely ate fast food.
However, families eat less home cooked meal that do not contain vegetable and eat more fast
food than before since parents became busier. Last reason is portion of the each meal got bigger.
It became two to five times bigger than people used to.
All of those reasons, they decided to have healthy and nutritional food at school to reduce
overweight children because making just a few lifestyle changes, they can help children to be
healthier ,and they already know what they need to do. First, movement they made was taking
out all vending machines that sell high sugar of the pops and soft drinks. Second movement was
changing school meals contain fewer calories, less fat and salt, and more fruit, vegetables and
whole grains to be healthier. Changing menu at the school’s cafeteria is good for the nutritional
education at school and reducing fat children in the United States, and most parents agreed with
this. On the plan, there are more nutrition inside of the meal by using wheat, vegetable, fruits,
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and low fat dressing. (Chart before/after Elementary school Lunch Menu) People agreed with
this program at first, but after the demonstration, people disagreed the program. The meals they
served at the demonstration days are an apple, mashed vegetables, and half of the corn dog, an
orange, and chocolate milk, and banana and yogurt, and soup, boiled strings pees, nugget, and
chocolate milk. The reason that led this is local school system set own their menu because of the
poor budget. All of those meals do not looks delicious and taste do not well neither. Moreover,
those meals were not make students full or they did not like them at all, so they end up throwing
them to the garbage. Some of the students post comments on the social media, they said
“Thanks Michelle Obama”, “Yum school lunches”, or “It makes me stop eating school lunch”.
On this demonstration days, they just reduced amount of the meal to reduce calories. It was way
different than what they announced about plan of the menu. This demonstration made students to
stop buying meals at the school.
Through this failure of the demonstration, Michelle Obama learned some tips that they
can change. First of all, they can change the meal that children like instead what children do not
like. For example, they serve raw carrot on the demonstration, but they can change it to fried
vegetable that is flavorful. Also they can add some fruits for example, apples, oranges, or
bananas. Then they can add some main dish what children like such as chicken nuggets, little
slice of pizza or fries. All of those menu they can get enough nutrition, and children can enjoy
their meals. Consequently, they don’t have to go back home hungry. The last, Government
should have enough budget. For this, parents should support more with this idea, government can
put more budget for this program.
To sum up, I had been experiencing two countries’ school lunch, and I found out some
differences between Japan and United States. In Japan, I ate healthy balanced menu built by
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nutritionist, on the other hand, all I ate in the States’ high school are fast food. The United States’
school meal isn’t well nutrition and unhealthy for student that make children overweight.
Consequently, Michelle Obama built a program that changed the school meal to healthier than it
was. I strongly agreed with this program; however, first demonstrations were not going well
because of the contents of the meal, students threw out without eating. Michelle Obama’s idea is
not bad, so they can change some of the problem that was not organized well to provide food that
make children full and tasty food. It is simple to solve those problem by changing some
ingredients that children like (For example, use fruits instead of vegetable or provide some
dressing for the raw vegetables). I agree with Michelle Obama’s promotion because American
school should have good nutrition education for the children and reduce rate of children obesity.
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School Meal Around the World
Barcelona, Spain
Finland
South Korea
France
Demonstration
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Work Cite
Buzz Feed “16 School Lunches From Around The World” Sept. 16, 2014 Web Dec 9, 2014
http://www.buzzfeed.com/ailbhemalone/school-lunches-around-the-world
Elizabeth Harrington 1M kids stop school lunch due to Michelle Obama’s standards The
Washington Times March 6, 2014
“President Obama Signs Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 Into Law” The White House
December 13, 2010
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2010/12/13/president-obama-signs-h
ealthy-hunger-free-kids-act-2010-law
“Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act” USDA Web. Dec 9, 2014
http://www.fns.usda.gov/tags/healthy-hunger-free-kids-act-0
Heather Laskin “Student Organizes Boycott To Protest Michelle Obama’s Healthy Hunger-Free
Kids Act” Western Journalism Nov 14, 2014
Before/ After Elementary school Lunch Menu 2010 Web Dec 2014
http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/cnr_chart.pdf