A Comparison of Adolescents Consumption of Micro and Macro Nutrient Rich Foods

The study involves a comparison of pupils' consumption of macro and micro nutrient rich food as well as healthy and less healthy snacks after being exposed to a teaching model on balanced diet developed by the researcher which takes into cognisance pupils' prior knowledge of healthy eating. Healthy snacks are snacks that are low in fat and sugar while less healthy snacks are snacks that are high in fat and sugar. The study was carried out in Britain, United Kingdom in summer term of 2007. Participants were year 7 pupils of Ceredigion Local Education Authority in rural Mid-Wales, they were requested to fill-in a Food Diary of food consumed at breakfast, lunch and dinner times including mid-morning and mid-afternoon snacks for five days (Thursday to Monday). This is to include both food consumed at home at weekend as well as school meals consumed at school during weekdays. There was evidence of increase of consumption of healthy snack as well as the consumption of macro nutrients (carbohydrate, fat and protein) and micro nutrients (vitamin, mineral and fibre); all six classes of food that makes up a balanced diet [1] after the intervention compared to before the intervention, although the rate of increase in the consumption of micro nutrient was not statistically significant compared to the increased in the consumption of macro nutrient. This study revealed that though the teaching model was able to alter eating behaviour in the desired direction of healthy eating which is the consumption of micro nutrient. More has to be done to encourage adolescents to consume more vitamin, mineral and fibre rich food items

EVALUATION OF TEACHING PRACTICE EXERCISE IN NIGERIA

Evaluation is centrally concerned with the making of value judgments. In the school setting, evaluation underpins the teacher’s development of curriculum activities, his/her selection of instructional objectives in his/her day-today lesson planning and choice of materials and methods by which to judge the progress of his/her students. Evaluation enables the teacher to make appropriate decisions about his/her on-going classroom activities and to plan future activities more purposefully and effectively in the light of his knowledge of the progress of his/her students. Appropriate decisions, however, depend upon correct judgments and these in turn can only be derived from adequate instruments and applications of knowledge glean as a result of training to become a teacher. This paper discussed the evaluation of student-teachers by supervisors who go the practicing schools to supervise the would-be-teachers (student-teachers) in order to ascertain that the would-be-teachers are putting into practice the theories and methods learnt; as well as an examination process to assess teaching effectiveness to grade the student-teachers. It was recommended that the assessment of student-teachers should be done by both the cooperating teacher (mentor) from the practicing school as well as the visiting supervisor from the training institutions as this is not currently the case.  Article visualizations

WASTE GENERATION AND ITS MANAGEMENT IN SCHOOLS

Waste management in schools continues to generate thoughts, interest and research because of the huge amount of the refuse that schools generation which include papers, cartons, cans, broken bottles, polymers which can be recycled but are rather turned out as rubbish to be collected as refuse. These refuse from schools are collected alongside other household refuses and heaped on streets or refuse dump with it antecedent health challenges which include unsightly heap of refuse, the odour emanating from such heap and the heap being a breeding ground for disease vectors like mosquitoes, cockroaches, rodents, reptiles among others. Among all the significant contributors of environmental waste, schools have been chosen for this write up since the waste generation rate and its corresponding composition has not been reported or has been underestimated. Hence, the present paper is an attempt to fill up this gap in knowledge. The objective of this paper specifically is to raise awareness among educators, learners and their families of the cause and effect of poor waste management and the benefits of recycling, reuse and reduce as waste management strategies. Also, to provide environmental tools to enhance quality of life and assist schools with portfolio development and waste minimization projects.  Article visualizations

EMPIRICAL EVALUATION OF CLINICAL SUPERVISION MODEL OF SUPERVISING PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS

There are few empirical evidences of the effectiveness of the various teaching practice supervision models. This study is aimed to add to the dearth of empirical evidences of effectiveness of teaching practice supervision model by evaluating the clinical supervision model. Clinical supervision is a method of supervision whereby the supervisor is involved with the pre-service-teacher in a close, ‘helping, relationship’. Essentially, clinical supervision in education involves a teacher trainee receiving information from a supervisor who has observed the teacher trainee’s performance and who serves as both a mirror and a sounding board to enable the teacher trainee critically examine and possibly alter his/her own professional practice. Within the context of such supervision, ideas are shared and help is given in order to improve the teacher trainee’s ability through the analysis of objective data that is collected during the observation.  Article visualizations

Teaching/learning methods and students' classification of food items

Purpose – This study aims to investigate the effectiveness of a teaching method (TLS (Teaching/Learning Sequence)) based on a social constructivist paradigm on students' conceptualisation of classification of food.Design/methodology/approach – The study compared the TLS model developed by the researcher based on the social constructivist paradigm with the Regular Teaching Method (RTM) in use in the school. Students exposed to the TLS model constituted the experimental group, while the students exposed to the RTM constituted the control group. The design was a pre-test/post-test control design with a retention-phase.Findings – Results before intervention revealed gross misconceptions of pupils' classification of food, while after intervention there was significant improvement of the TLS over RTM.Research limitations/implications – The context of the research is limited to students' conceptualisation of classification of food items into the five classes of food, i.e. carbohydrate, protein, fat, vitamin, and mineral. Although food group allocation was validated from previous literature, it is still a potential limitation as a single food item may contain more than one nutrient, which makes its classification in a single food class difficult.Practical implications – Understanding whether students' conceptualisation of classes of food is changed by the information they received by established methods would be valuable when devising methods of delivering nutrition education.Social implications – Food provision in schools must support the messages that pupils receive through the formal curriculum.Originality/value – Education can be immensely helpful in the pursuit of better understanding by children regarding healthy eating