NUACHTÁN ELEMENTARY | June 2022

Spelling Bee

By Elizabeth Jasso | English Coordinator

On April 1st we experienced with great excitement and enthusiasm our first Spelling Bee contest at the school. Our students all the way from Pre First through 6th grade prepared themselves, for several months, for this great event and the work, without a doubt, was reflected from the classroom to the moment they came face to face with a new stage and new judges in the theater.

You are probably wondering what else did our students develop besides memory with this contest. The reality is that this type of exercises allow us to develop multiple skills, the most important of which are communication, cognitive and self-control skills. For example, in terms of communication skills, our students learn to express themselves clearly and correctly, develop listening skills and the most obvious one, speaking in front of an audience.

Likewise, there are the cognitive skills among which we can highlight the development of memory and the use and understanding of new words in context.

On the other hand, we have the development of self-control skills, in which students must feel empathy for their peers, be confident and secure to speak in front of an audience and handle pressure, concentrate and spell words correctly.

Without a doubt, quite a challenge!

Finally, we can say that students do a metacognitive exercise in which they recognize their mistakes, create strategies for improvement and plan how to win the next contest, building confidence and developing their competitive spirit in an atmosphere of fellowship, knowing that they are accompanied by their teachers and peers.

We’re definitely ready for our Spelling Bee 2023!

What impact does food have on your child’s development?

By Prefirst and 1st Grade Elementary Teachers

Breakfast helps learning

• It has benefits on school performance, improves concentration during morning activities, as well as learning.
• If a student skips this important meal, he/she feels tired and weak.

How breakfast helps your child

Breakfast has many advantages:

• It improves memory.
• Improved grades.
• Better attention span to decrease irritability.
• Healthier body weight.
• Better overall nutrition. 

Do you usually leave home without breakfast? What are the foods your children eat before going to school? Do you give them lunch? Experts assure that this first food of the day is the most important, because it provides the required energy for the good functioning of the organism and it is essential for school children.

Elia Domínguez Sánchez, a nutritionist at the Mexican Social Security Institute, explained that the energy provided by breakfast is the brain’s main fuel, which guarantees children’s attention span during the first hours of school. This is reflected in better academic results.

Eating the right kind of food improves attention span in class, facilitates reading comprehension and benefits academic performance. However, in Mexico, a high percentage of the population does not eat breakfast or eats it very late. For example, 2 out of every 10 children skip it; ideally, children should eat a complete breakfast with milk or its derivatives, fruit, as well as cereals to avoid low blood sugar levels, bad moods or falling asleep in class.

An adequate breakfast

• Low-fat dairy products that provide protein, calcium and vitamins.

• Protein foods that provide fat, vitamins and minerals.

• Fruits that provide water, vitamins, minerals and fiber.

• Bread and cereals, preferably whole grains, which provide the body with fiber and carbohydrates that give energy, vitamins and minerals.

Suggestions for a nutritious lunch

Specialists recommend having daily intakes of fruits, vegetables, seeds and minimize the consumption of fried food, junk food and sugars.

The ideal is a portion of fruit or vegetable, a meal and a healthy dessert with moderate amounts of sugar such as gelatin and enough liquid.

Some suggestions for lunch are:

• Seasonal fruit or vegetable such as jicama, carrot, cucumber, apple.
• Nuts, almonds, pistachios.
• Bean burritos with cheese and avocado.
• Chicken, cheese and vegetable sandwich.
• Tuna sandwich.
• Jello.
• Plain or prepared water.

How do you make children aware of eating a nutritious lunch?

Some strategies you can use to get children to eat a nutritious lunch are the following:

• Serve a variety of healthy foods and snacks.  By offering a wide range of nutritious foods, children will be able to identify the food of their choice.
• Introduce them to the benefits of foods such as fruits, vegetables, legumes, etc.
• Talk to children about the foods they eat on a daily basis and make them aware of how these foods can be detrimental to their health.
• Drink water daily and also talk to them about how it is of utmost importance for a healthy diet.

Consequences of excessive sugar consumption

A diet high in sugar could bring important complications to our health in the short and long term. These complications could lead to symptoms, diseases, disorders and deterioration in our health.

Too much added sugar could lead to chronic inflammation. Science has shown that chronic low-grade inflammation can become a silent killer that contributes to cardiovascular disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes and other conditions.

In a 2014 study published in JAMA Internal Medicine, Dr. Hu and colleagues found an association between a high-sugar diet and an increased risk of dying from heart disease. “The higher the intake of added sugar, the higher the risk of heart disease,” says Dr. Hu.

Consuming too much added sugar can raise blood pressure and increase chronic inflammation, both of which are pathological pathways to heart disease. Excessive sugar consumption, especially in sugary drinks, also contributes to weight gain by tricking your body into turning off its appetite control system because liquid calories are not as satisfying as calories from solid foods. Therefore, it is easier for people to add more calories to their regular diet when they consume sugary drinks.

Multiple studies have found a link between high sugar diets and depression.

Excessive sugar consumption causes imbalances in certain brain chemicals. These imbalances can lead to depression and may even increase the long-term risk of developing a mental health disorder in some people.

Emerging research has found that high-sugar diets can affect cognitive functioning, even in the absence of extreme weight gain or excessive energy intake.

Bibliography:

https://www.healthychildren.org/Spanish/healthy-living/nutrition/Paginas/breakfast-for-learning.aspx

.https://www.reporteindigo.com/piensa/desayunar-optimiza-la-capacidad-aprendizaje-consumos-alimentos-desarrollo-ninos-edad-escolar/

Professor Felice Jacka | Bitesize, Retrieved from https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/the-sweet-danger-of-sugar#:~:text=%22The%20effects%20of%20added%20sugar,Hu. Harvard Health Publishing. Harvard Medical School. 2022

Huang, Qingyi, Huan Liu, Katsuhiko Suzuki, Sihui Ma, and Chunhong Liu. 2019. “Linking What We Eat to Our Mood: A Review of Diet, Dietary Antioxidants, and Depression” Antioxidants 8, no. 9: 376. https://doi.org/10.3390/antiox8090376

Retrieved from https://www.healthline.com/health/mental-health/how-sugar-harms-mental-health#brain-zapper Medical Affairs. Healthline Media a Red Ventures Company. 2005-2022

Importance of school swimming

By Abraham Juárez | Swimming Coordinator

“Its objective is to complement the integral formation of the students using water as one more mean of physical education in the school environment”.

It is aimed at our entire Elementary community and its main objective is the development of aquatic motor skills and sports skills which are:

• Floating
• Breathing
• Propulsion
• Maximum autonomy
• Displacements
• Sliding 
• Basic and complex jumps
• Balancing
• Spins
• Throwing
• Receptions
• Rhythms
• Dragging

These skills are part of an educational and organized approach, which will follow an order of progression according to each school grade.

In school swimming one can acquire knowledge such as flotation and breathing, but also other learnings can be developed, which are a transposition of what has been learned in other subjects. For example, we learn a specific language of this medium with which we can write an essay about what we have learned in the water, we also talk about mathematics by counting the seconds that an apnea lasts or by transferring the laps we do to a total of meters traveled, we can learn about physics by realizing that my partner does not weigh the same in and out of the water and I learn knowledge of the environment by mastering a totally different environment to the terrestrial one.

These are some of the benefits of school swimming within the educational environment (Herrero, 2010).

• It benefits a correct evolution of basic physical qualities and perceptual-motor skills.
• Avoids the increase of muscular atrophy.
• Develops self-confidence and self-control.
• Increases autonomy and self-esteem.
• Develops the social role.
• It favors the acquisition of hygiene and health habits.

For all this and what is developed in the practice of swimming, it is of utmost importance that our students experience each of their classes for better training in all motor areas.

References

Herrero, J. J. G. (2010). Aquatic activities in Primary Education. EmásF: digital magazine of physical education, (6), 27-35.

Learning Experiences

By Elementary 6th grade teachers

Learning experiences are based on proposed situations that are approached through gradual elements, they allow the acquisition of new knowledge through moments in which the students test their skills, attitudes and knowledge, placing them in each experience at the appropriate moment.

Meaningful learning, according to Ausubel, requires starting from the learners’ previous knowledge, providing moments and references that allow the acquisition of others through modeling and practice, being attractive, creative, innovative and not requiring only memorization.

These proposals establish, in the first moment, catching the student’s attention with the recounting or preparation of previous knowledge, retaking the aspiration of the acquisition of other more complex ones giving step by step in a first moment to previous knowledge, then to modeling, researching, putting into practice, reflection and application.

In 6th grade, we begin a cycle of learning experiences with the following unit of inquiry. We present some of them that reflect the path to self-knowledge and identity, so crucial at this stage of adolescence.

Transdisciplinary theme: Who we are Title: Unravel yourself

1. Students receive a letter and photograph from their parents where they express the physical, emotional and social changes during their childhood and adolescence, narrate interests in those stages of life and their immediate context, invite their children to enjoy and know each stage of their lives. (Triggering activity).
2. Students express their knowledge about the topic, know their physical, emotional and social changes in the stage in which they are. (Previous knowledge)
3. They know the theories of the stages of human development and present the stages of human development according to Piaget, Erikson and Thomas Armstrong.
4. They take up those stages from physical, emotional, social changes in relation to social functioning and according to physical capacity.
5. Identify their physical, emotional and social characteristics in which they have observed a change.
6. They describe themselves in different aspects when writing their autobiography, talking about the changes they have experienced throughout their lives.
7. Through the film “Turning Red”, students identified with some physical, emotional and social changes in adolescence.
8. Students represent each stage of their life to form a photographic album where physical, emotional and social changes are reflected individually.
9. They recognize themselves in the stage they are in and formulate conclusions that allow them to deepen in the physical, emotional, and social changes, reflect on decision making through values, with responsibility, the development of their identity, empathy, belonging and finally the construction of their personality, all in relation to human dignity.