NUTRITION PHYSIOLOGY LESSON PLAN
GRADE LEVEL(S): 6-8
TITLE: Go Lean With Protein
NEXT GENERATION STANDARDS:
1. Describe valid health information from home, school, and community. (HE.6.B.1.2)
2. Select healthy alternatives over unhealthy alternatives when making a decision.
(HE.7.B.3.6)
3. Analyze the relationship between healthy behaviors and personal health. (HE.8.C.1.1)
NATIONAL HEALTH STANDARDS:
1. Determine when health-related situations require the application of a thoughtful decisionmaking process.
2. Assess personal health practices.
3. Demonstrate behaviors to avoid or reduce health risks to self and others.
BACKGROUND:
Proteins are important to have in ones diet because these play an important part in the health and
maintenance of the body. Choosing proteins that are lean and low in cholesterol will provide the
needed nutrients without the extra fat. The amount of food from the Meat and Beans Group of
the Food Pyramid that one needs to eat depends on age, sex and level of physical activity.
OBJECTIVES:
The student(s) will be able to:
1. Calculate the ounces of meat and beans required according to age, sex, and physical
activity.
2. Create a personalized eating plan.
3. Explain the recommended daily amounts of proteins for boys and girls.
4. List examples of healthy foods containing proteins.
MATERIALS:
Protein Daily Recommendations Sheet
Learning about Proteins Sheet
What Happens to Your Food After You Eat It Sheet
Protein True/False Questions
Food Labels (brought to class by students)
STUDENT-LEARNING SKILLS:
The student will keep a weekly log of protein consumption to better understand how to make
leaner and more varied selections of foods pertaining to the Meat and Beans Group. The activity
will enhance student awareness of eating more fish, dry beans or peas, and nuts. The catabolism
of proteins will be the primary learning goal of this activity.
PROCEDURE:
1. Encourage students to visit the www.MyPyramid.gov Web Site and have them calculate
the ounces of meat or beans that they need based upon their age, sex, and activity level.
2. Familiarize students with the “ounce equivalents” unit of measurement when referring to
protein consumption in the Protein Daily Recommendations sheet.
3. Allow students to read Learning about Proteins and What Happens to Your Food After
You Eat It sheets and discuss catabolism of proteins.
4. Provide students with the Protein True/False Questions and allow them to defend their
responses (Note: Answers are all true).
5. Students must read and interpret their food labels for amounts of protein.
STUDENT ASSESSMENT:
A personalized eating plan to maintain recommended daily amounts of meat or beans will be
assessed. An essay explaining the biochemical breakdown of proteins will also be assessed.
HOME EXTENSION:
Choose any food from the Meat and Beans Group and develop a flow chart that illustrates the
catabolism of the specific food and where it finally travels to in the body systems.
REFERENCES:
www.MyPyramid.gov
www.ag.ndsu.nodak.edu
Kids Health from Nemours
North American Society for Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition
(NASPGHAN)
http://www.clemson.edu/extension/hgic/food/pdf/hgic4020.pdf
VOCABULARY:
Ounce equivalent, percent lean, protein, amino acid, omega-3, catabolism, enzyme, absorption
Learning about Proteins
You probably know you need to eat protein, but what is it? Many foods contain protein (say:
pro-teen), but the best sources are beef, poultry, fish, eggs, dairy products, nuts, seeds, and
legumes like black beans and lentils. Protein builds up, maintains, and replaces the tissues in
your body. (Not the tissues you blow your nose in! We mean the stuff your body's made up of.)
Your muscles, your organs, and your immune system are made up mostly of protein.
Your body uses the protein you eat to make lots of specialized protein molecules that have
specific jobs. For instance, your body uses protein to make hemoglobin (say: hee-muh-glowbin), the part of red blood cells that carries oxygen to every part of your body. Other proteins are
used to build cardiac muscle. What's that? Your heart! In fact, whether you're running or just
hanging out, protein is doing important work like moving your legs, moving your lungs, and
protecting you from disease.
All About Amino Acids
When you eat foods that contain protein, the digestive juices in your stomach and intestine go to
work. They break down the protein in food into basic units, called amino acids (say uh-mee-no
a-sids). The amino acids then can be reused to make the proteins your body needs to maintain
muscles, bones, blood, and body organs.
Proteins are sometimes described as long necklaces with differently shaped beads. Each bead is a
small amino acid. These amino acids can join together to make thousands of different proteins.
Scientists have found many different amino acids in protein, but 22 of them are very important to
human health.
Of those 22 amino acids, your body can make 13 of them without you ever thinking about it.
Your body can't make the other nine amino acids, but you can get them by eating protein-rich
foods. They are called essential amino acids because it's essential that you get them from the
foods you eat.
Different Kinds of Protein
Protein from animal sources, such as meat and milk, is called complete, because it contains all
nine of the essential amino acids. Most vegetable protein is considered incomplete because it
lacks one or more of the essential amino acids. This can be a concern for someone who doesn't
eat meat or milk products. But people who eat a vegetarian diet can still get all their essential
amino acids by eating a wide variety of protein-rich vegetable foods.
For instance, you can't get all the amino acids you need from peanuts alone, but if you have
peanut butter on whole-grain bread you're set. Likewise, red beans won't give you everything
you need, but red beans and rice will do the trick. The good news is that you don't have to eat all
the essential amino acids in every meal. As long as you have a variety of protein sources
throughout the day, your body will grab what it needs from each meal.
How Much Is Enough?
You can figure out how much protein you need if you know how much you weigh. Each day,
kids need to eat about 0.5 grams of protein for every pound (0.5 kilograms) they weigh. That's a
gram for every 2 pounds (1 kilogram) you weigh. Your protein needs will grow as you get
bigger, but then they will level off when you reach adult size. Adults, for instance, need about 60
grams per day.
To figure out your protein needs, multiply your weight in pounds times 0.5 or you can just take
your weight and divide by 2. For instance, a 70-pound (or 32-kilogram) kid should have about 35
grams of protein every day. If you only know your weight in kilograms, you need about 1 gram
of protein each day for every kilogram you weigh.
You can look at a food label to find out how many protein grams are in a serving. But if you're
eating a balanced diet, you don't need to keep track of it. It's pretty easy to get enough protein.
Here's an example of how a kid might get about 35 grams of protein in a day:
2 tablespoons (15 milliliters) peanut butter (7 grams protein)
1 cup (240 milliliters) low-fat milk (8 grams protein)
1 ounce (30 grams) or two domino-size pieces of cheddar cheese (7 grams protein)
1.5 ounces (90 grams) chicken breast (10.5 grams protein)
½ cup (80 grams) broccoli (2 grams protein)
Of course, you can choose your own favorite combination of protein-rich foods — now that
you're a pro at protein!
How much is needed?
Most people should eat about 5½ ounce equivalents of protein daily. The specific amount of food
needed from the meat and beans group depends on age, sex, and level of physical activity. The
chart below shows amounts that are appropriate for people who get less than 30 minutes per day
of moderate physical activity, beyond normal daily activities. If you are more physically active,
you may be able to consume more while staying within your calorie needs.
Daily Recommendations for Meat and Beans
Age
Ounce
Equivalents
2-3 years
2
4-8 years
3-4
Children
Girls
9-18
5
9-13 years
5
14-18 years
6
19-30 years
5½
Boys
Women
31+ years
Men
5
19-30 years
6½
31-50 years
6
51+ years
5½
A 3-ounce portion of meat is about the size of a deck of cards. That is a little more than half the
recommended amount of protein food from the meat and beans group that is needed by a person
eating 2,000 calories a day. Americans usually eat adequate amounts from the meat and beans
group. However, we need to select a wider variety of leaner foods and include fish, beans, nuts
and seeds more often.
TRUE/FALSE QUESTIONS
1. Choose extra lean ground beef. The label should be at least 90 percent lean. You can find
ground beef that is 93 percent or 95 percent lean.
2. The leanest choices of beef are round steak, roasts, top loin, top sirloin, and chuck
shoulder and arm roasts.
3. When choosing poultry, boneless skinless chicken breasts and turkey cutlets are the
leanest.
4. The leanest pork cuts are pork loin, tenderloin, center loin and ham.
5. Lean or low-fat turkey, roast beef and ham usually are lower in fat than salami or
bologna.