Emily Gonzalez
10th Grade
Neto
Tucker
N.E.W. School
10/27/16
Unit 1: Nutrition Assessment
The implications that food has on health, the economy, ecology, and the community is a subject that is rarely touched on in public high schools for more than a week in a health class. Except in N.E.W. (Next Evolution in Work Based Learning) School. Over the course of two months, I have learned about the chemical processes that organisms go through to make food into energy, the implications of industrial and organic foods, and the current research that is going into the
The chemical processes within cells that organisms cycle through every day are called cellular respiration (animals) and photosynthesis (plants) (Some fungi go through both or part of these processes). The first cycle we learned about was cellular respiration, which converts glucose, or sugar, into ATP, adenosine phosphate. To be able to go through this process in an animal though, food has to be digested by going through the digestive system. To represent this, NEW school used tubes and food to simulate the process of digestion. The digestive system breaks down food with both physical energy (mastication and stomach churning) and chemical enzymes, such as amylase in saliva or lipase and lactase in the intestine. The small intestine absorbs all of the nutrients, then the small intestine and rectum get rid of the waste.
Here is NEW learning about the digestive system by making a model of it with scissor and cup teeth, nylon intestines and plastic bag stomachs.
With only the nutrients left, sugar then goes into the cells to start the cellular respiration process. We learned this through the allegory of converting a cake mix (to represent sugar) into muffins (ATP). In cellular respiration, the cytoplasm organelle of the cell breaks glucose molecules into half, also known as pyruvate, then the mitochondria puts the pyruvate into the Krebs cycle, which creates hydrogens that go through the Electron Transport Chain, thus turning into ATP. Everything past glycolysis requires oxygen from the lungs to function. Photosynthesis is the opposite, turning sunlight and carbon dioxide into glucose and oxygen. So plants and animals depend on each other. The plants create the glucose for them to function, and breathe out oxygen that animals need. Humans, or the animals they eat, eat the plants that have the glucose they need to convert into ATP.
The process of cellular respiration in an animal cell
The process of converting sunlight into glucose - photosynthesis in a plant cell
After learning about the science that goes into bodies using food to make energy, I could better understand the implications that different food has on a person’s health. As omnivores, humans were able to live and thrive anywhere, but since humans have existed, they have encountered a dilemma. The dilemma of knowing what we should eat, versus what will kill us. Humans still encounter this today, in the aisles of the grocery store. Everything that they buy can have larger implications towards their community, their overall health, the environment and ethics. Through the process of reading Omnivore’s dilemma, I have learned about what goes into industrial food, and how it is ultimately unsustainable. It is all built on “a single species growing in a single landscape: a monoculture of corn” (Pollan, Michael, “The Omnivore’s Dilemma”, pg. 410). With the giant industry of number 2 corn in America, grown only for the use of chemicals, the United States has put it in everything, from cleaning supplies, to frozen dinners, to salmon, to beef, and to anything that went through a factory. Corn in the forms it is transformed to might not even be digestible. Organic food is only so much better. Yes, it isn’t always filled to the brim with corn, but just because something has the USDA approved organic label doesn’t mean that is is truly sustainable. They still use up a large amount of fossil fuels to ship across the country. To keep their animals healthy, they usually have to lock them up in cages, which is the opposite of what consumers want. The only truly sustainable foods are local, naturally raised foods, which also pose a problem for people in areas where that is not possible. So, overall, all food has different implications on everything, and it is up to the consumer to decide what they want to support and what they want to put into their bodies.
While researching for the final unit project, I have learned about the necessary nutrients that people need to survive and how different diets affect people. For our final unit project, my partner and I discussed about the movie Forks over Knives, and then went into further detail about vegan and non-vegan diets. We also contacted two nutritionists to learn more about the topic. Through these interviews and research, I learned about nutrients that are necessary for the human body. Both of the nutritionists agree that every person’s best diet isn’t always the same, but it is good to eat whole foods such as vegetables, whole grains, fruits, beans, and possibly even milk and meat. Some people are affected differently by the same foods, so as long as you get the correct amount of nutrients and not eat things that are unnatural, or too much, then you will be healthy. Protein, Vitamin B-12 and Omega-3’s were all nutrients that my partner and I agreed were necessary, but could get from different sources. It all depends on a consumer’s choice of cuisine and culture.
(Here is a link to our Podcast if you want to learn more about this subject: https://soundcloud.com/emily-gonzalez-506558984/tracks)
To wrap things all together, this unit I learned why and how organisms digest food, how the food a consumer buys affects both the economy and health of the consumer and the nation, that it doesn’t matter what diet you are on as long as you are eating whole foods and getting the proper amount of nutrients. Nutrition is an important subject to learn, especially in this epidemic of health-related diseases. It is a subject that students should learn more about so that they can make the right decisions when they are older, and it is a subject that I am glad I learned in this new method of project based learning.
