Hello my name is Danae Snyder, I am a senior at PSU and this is my Nutrition 360 portfolio.
Author Post 1
Here is an awesome blog that I found recently
Kristin Brown is a Registered Dietician with many specialties including; GI disorders, pregnancy nutrition, sports nutrition, and many more! Her blog includes recipes, health & nutrition topics, product reviews etc. so check it out for some great health and nutrition advice!
The first thing that I notice in this blog is 1. The logo, 2. The colors/cleanliness of the page, and 3. Her biography/ opening statement on her hompage. What draws me into the blog is the overall look and color theme. Its cleanliness makes it so that everything important stands out, all the fonts and words are easy to read. Another thing that stood out was that she has a cute name for the blog as well as a unique logo, an avocado, which pertains to nutrition.
At the top of the page she has a place you can easily sign up for a new years resolution in ‘loose[ing] weight in 2018,’ followed by her most recent post to the page. She includes a personal picture with a description of her credentials, and where she is located and why she is motivated in the field of nutrition and health.
What I really liked about the pages design is how appealing it looks. Her pictures all have natural tones and aren’t overwhelmingly covering her page. There is just a white backdrop, which makes everything brighter and easy to read on top of. Everything is clearly marked and separated for different purposes. She has a separate section with just recipes and tabs for other recipes, as well as a question/comment section and other buttons to click off of to see different aspects of the blog.
Kristin speaks in an informal way, she addresses her audience as ‘you’ and uses slang terms and makes things all capitalized if she deems it important.
All of the information that she puts out there seems very legit. She includes a section of her page that is all about her and what she does as well as what her many specialties are. She also adds in links behind important colored words that take you to specific sites and places that she is talking about.
I think the way that she comes off by informally addressing her readers, as well as the way she makes the topics she talks about seem important, helps to entice the readers. While within her posts she emphasizes how she goes about things or her own personal experience with the topic, I believe this is another way to keep the readers interested if they are experiencing the same problem or find themselves in similar situations etc..
One thing that I like about her blog is how clear she makes everything, it is easily maneuverable, labeled, and her titles for blog posts are in the same color. Another thing that I like is how she has a creative name and title for the website, as well as including a description on why she is in the field. What I specifically like was how she included,“…focused on living a real food life in a world of convenience and drive thrus,” and “educating the world on the power of using food as medicine.” Both of these address real world issues in the field of health and nutrition especially in the United States and I feel that it is just important to bring everything back to how food can be used as/along with medicine, which is an idea many people overlook now-a-days. Lastly, something that I took away as important but would be used in a real blog sense was that she includes a tab, “work with me,” and here she places specific questions at the top asking the reader what do they need to do to live a healthier life. After that she goes on to state why someone might want to work with her. This form of self-promotion is key to targeting the audience that you want to help/are able to help, and giving them key reasons why and how they can be helped is more reason for them to be motivated to do so. It is important to address these reasons because many of them are probably the same reasons why that person is not engaging in healthy behaviors or making changes that they want to. Overall I thought this was a great blog and I will definately be keeping up with it to recieve some of my own advice.
Author Post 2
Attention all College Students!
Hey everyone! Today I will be sharing a piece of nutrition education material that I have specifically chosen on the topic of college students and their consumption of fruits and vegetables.
As many college students know, we tend to run off of caffeine and poorly constricted diets in the college atmosphere. Why? Because of time, money and knowledge, many students in the age of 18 - 25 are learning to live on their own, which includes cooking and grocery shopping for oneself. This poster proposes that due to current research, they have found that many college students do not meet the reccommended daily servings of fruits and vegetables that the USDA encourages. This poster embodies the idea of healthier living and dining on PSU campuses through encouraging the consumption of fruits and vegetables on a daily basis.
What I found most interesting about this material is that they provided a call to action directed at students by acknowledging the placement of carrots on healthy food options in the dining commons. The poster specifically states, "look for the carrot," which gives the students and readers something to remember as a take-away message. The poster also includes a lot of the color orange as well, which helps to further encase the message.
Another thing that I thought was interesting is that it encourages students to take a picture of their healthy meal and posting their plate containing half fruits and vegetables. This is another call to action specifically directed towards the college population who use social media commonly. By encouraging students and readers to post pictures of their plates containing the hashtag "psuplate," on instagram, facebook and twitter, also encourages the movement of healthy eating through social media. This is beneficial because the people who made this poster are influencing an already popular habit of students to post things that they like on social media. By encouraging students to go along with the healthy message, it can encourage more students to join in.
Specifically as a nutrition educator, I could use this information obviously to inform college-aged students. This poster could easily be applied to other age groups as the reading level is not too difficult but does pose certain words that could be replaced in order to advocate for yonger groups in high school or middle school. For example the words, ‘consume,’ and ‘produce’ plus the reference of the United States Department of Agriculture makes this posters reading level on the more difficult side and aimed at college level students. The use of social media influence will aim this posters success towards the technology inclined populations and younger generatons that would be more likely to fulfill the call to actions.
My personal critique on this nutrition education material would be that overall it is a good piece of material and easy to read. The colors are bright and eye catching, although the white lettering on top of green text boxes are more difficult to read. I like how they made it interactive and asked students to look specifically in their dining halls for carrots indicating healthy food options. One thing that they could have done better was providing concrete examples of fruits and vegetables on the poster. By the readers seeing specific examples of what the poster is asking them to do will better solidify the message they are getting across. By stating, "show us your greens" sometimes isn't enough information.
Material Flesch Reading score: 5.9
Citation
PennState Student Affairs: University Health Services. Hey Penn State Whats on Your Plate. Campus Dining at Penn State.
Author Post 3
Breakfast for the Non-believers
Breakfast = Breaking the Fast
Breakfast is often known as the most important meal of the day, but what does breakfast really consist of? What time is it? What foods does it involve?
The purpose of breakfast is to fuel our bodies for the day, & hold us over until we get the chance at our next meal. Within our meals we want to consider things such as the quality of foods we are eating. We want to provide ourselves with more nutrient/energy dense foods, over high calorie foods with little nutritional value. Such nutrient dense foods will be metabolized into essential components that our bodies use throughout the day.
Some studies have shown an association between breakfast consumption and cognitive performance, sense of well-being, as well as extended benefits related to general nutrition intake, diet quality, and even weight management (1,2).
As shown in O'Neil et. al.'s article, "The Role of Breakfast in Health: Definition Criteria for a Quality Breakfast," she provides a recommended criteria for defining a quality breakfast, consistent with what science-based DGA & MyPlate plus more guidelines, as well as making it affordable and accessible for all ages and cultural groups:
- Energy: 15-25% of recommended total calories from a mix of carbohydrates, lean proteins & healthy fats
- Nutrients & components w/ positive health effects: minimum of 10% or daily value for as many nutrients as possible with a goal of 20%
- Food components to reduce: sodium, saturated fat, & limit foods that provide low nutritional value
- Food groups: aim for at least 3 different food groups such as riber-rich grains, nonfat or low-fat dairy, fruits & vegetables, and lean proteins.
- Portion sizes: appropriate for age, sex and daily energy requirements
- Nutrient dense foods & beverages: consider foods and beverages that deliver a balance of nutrients for the calories that it has.
For someone like me who doesn't like breakfast and strictly relies on caffeine for daily energy, here are some healthy breakfast ideas given from O'Neil and authors:
- 1 cereal bar + oz. string cheese + 1 medium banana
- 1 cup frosted shredded wheat cereal + 1 cup fat free milk + 1/2 cup strawberries
- 1 scrambled egg + 1Tbsp shredded cheddar + 1 cup Orange Juice + 1 slice whole wheat toast w/ fruit spread
- 1 slice whole wheat toast + 1Tbsp. peanut butter + 1 medium banana + 1 cup apple juice
Current research on Undergrad Breakfast Behaviors
A study done in 2017 by K. Sunnarborg and A. Newell studied the breakfast habits and beliefs of undergraduate students to see how it affected their mood. They found that although 85% of students responded that breakfast increases their mental activity and 72% agreed that breakfast is apart of a healthy lifestyle, only 38.7% of participants had actually eaten breakfast that day.
With the recurring theme of individuals education/knowledge not being the issue, people are still not adhering to the healthy lifestyles they know are better for them. Although people are aware that breakfast may be an important meal in the day and apart of a healthy lifestyle less than 40% actually eat breakfast (1).
Therefore as someone who personally does not enjoy breakfast, but knows that it is important to a good start in the day, here is a nutritional blog site that I found with some easily applicable breakfast behaviors tailored for college students.
THE COLLEGE NUTRITIONIST – BY RACHEL PAUL
Rachel Paul’s website is super clean with tons of great resources available right off her home page. She has recipes available, meal preparation and planning schedules, grocery store guides, restaurant recommendations & much more.
For this specific post, eating right when you wake up is sometimes unappetizing to people and therefore I would recommend snacking. Since I often have earlier classes I will take something with me to campus and once my first class is over I tend to get hungry. Therefore I am not technically skipping breakfast, but eating when my body is actually hungry for something in the mornings.
Rachel's website has:
- 7 - Day meal plan
- Filling foods to fuel your day
- On - the - go snacks
- Study snacks for midterms
Blog sites can be a great way to stay motivated and on task when it comes to building a healthy lifestyle especially for students. I hope you can all stay motivated through breakfast!
Resources
Spence Charles. Breakfast: The most important meal of the day? International Journal of Gastronomy and Food Science. 2017; 8: 1-6.
O’Neil E. Carol, Byrd-Bredbenner Carol, Hayes Dayle, Jana Laura, Klinger e. Sylvia, Stephenson-Martin Susan. The Role of Breakfast in Health: Definition and Criteria for a Quality Breakfast. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. 2014; 12: S8-S26.
Sunnarborg K., Newell A.. The Relationship Between Breakfast Consumption and Mood among Undergraduate College Students. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. 2017; 10: A131.
Rachel Paul, RD - http://www.collegenutritionist.com
Credits:
Created with images by Kaz - "blueberries blueberry fruit food blue berry sweet" • Pineapple Supply Co. - "Four pineapples" • ulleo - "chocolate food sweet" • Alexas_Fotos - "grapes fruits healthy" • FoodieFactor - "avocado avocados food" • kkolosov - "top view closeup vegetarianism healthy eating vegetables" • kaboompics - "technology digital tablet digital tablet computer device" • rawpixel - "beverage cafe coffee" • kkolosov - "top view closeup vegetarianism healthy eating vegetables" • Harshal S. Hirve - "Organic Carrots" • socialautomotive - "Automotive Social Media Marketing" • JESHOOTS - "laptop woman education" • loilamtan - "field rice fields cooked rice" • rawpixel - "table desktop cup" • Skitterphoto - "tea teabags black background macro kitchen drink" • inextra15 - "coffee drink dawn" • JayMantri - "breakfast bagel ham egg sandwich snack toasted" • jill111 - "grapefruit pink breakfast" • Daria-Yakovleva - "pancakes pancake hash browns food baking tasty" • jill111 - "blueberries cream dessert breakfast blueberry food berry" • jill111 - "blueberries summer fruit fresh healthy sweet organic"