Week 4
School
Lunch Important for Health and Education
2013
- 6 – 9
Reading skill
Children
usually need variety of nutrients for repairing their brain or body. Some
students also get beneficial meals for memorizing something best while some
students get free school lunch. According to Dakar Senegal said that school
lunch is important for health and education. The United Nations World Food Program
announces in 2013 state of school feeding worldwide report that supplying meals
and snacks to students has proven valuable. Researchers in Dakar, Senegal agree
with the United Nations World Food Program announce that supplying meals and
snacks to students has proven valuable. Supplying
free lunches for students in primary schools is way to help them being
healthier and increasing scores.
In
year 2009-2013, there is an experiment by researchers. They select 120 primary schools
from 4 poorest areas in the country. Sixty students received free, daily
lunches (rice with vegetables and either fish or meat, cooked in oil.) But 60
students did not receive meals. Abdoulaye Diagne, the director of the
Consortium for Social Economic Research in Dakar says students, who received
school meals were better able to memorize, learn and understand more than those
students receive meals. Bettina Luescher is with the World Food Program. School
meals are important for playing or learning in large activities. Kids can
concentrate in practicality. In addition, The "Food for Thought"
report says a malnourished child is almost 20 percent have trouble reading than
someone of the same age who has a good diet. Food is important for children.
Finally,
student schools that are poor should get free school lunch supporting from the
government. Receiving enough beneficial food is important for growing to be
adults in the future. Children should get nutrients enough in motivation their
brain and run to repair every part of body for running live. They also need
nutrients to memorize, study, play, and do activities in longer class. Student
schools received free school lunch can learn better new thing than whoever do
not have meals. Do you agree with this passage? Why? If you are the one of
government, how you solve problem about school lunch for children who are the
poors.
School
Lunch Important for Health and Education
2013
- 6 – 9
Original Manuscript
Welcome to As It Is,
your daily magazine show from VOA Learning English. I'm June Simms. Today we hear
about two studies on childhood hunger and its effects on educational
development and the world economy.
We
begin with a story out of Dakar, Senegal. School Lunch Important for Health and
Education Educators in low-income areas everywhere struggle with one of the
most basic barriers to teaching children -- hungry students. The United Nations
World Food Program says in its 2013 State of School Feeding Worldwide report
that supplying meals and snacks to students has proven valuable. Researchers in
Dakar, Senegal agree. They found that supplying free lunches to students in
rural primary schools not only made them healthier, it raised their test
scores. Avi Arditti has more.
During
the 2009-2010 academic years, researchers in Senegal did an experiment. They
selected 120 rural primary schools in four of the poorest areas of the country.
Students at half the schools received free, daily lunches -- a local dish of
rice with vegetables and either fish or meat, cooked in oil. Students at the
other 60 schools did not receive meals.
Abdoulaye
Diagne is the director of the Consortium for Social Economic Research in Dakar.
He led the study. He says students who received school meals were better able
to memorize and reason. He says they learned and understood more than those
students who did not receive meals. The
study found that standardized test scores went up an average of 7 percentage
points in French and 8.5 percentage points in math. The effect was even greater
for girls and for the youngest students.
The
World Food Program says that about $75 billion goes into school feeding
programs each year worldwide. Most of this money comes from governments. However,
the WFP says only 18 percent of children in the poorest countries receive a
daily meal at school. This compares to nearly half of children in middle-income
countries. Bettina Luescher is with the World Food Program.
"School
meals are a crucially important part and play a huge role in schools around the
world. It means, in practicality, kids can concentrate. They can study. They
stay in school. They will send their own children to school one day. Girls will
have fewer children if they have school meals and an education; they marry at a
later stage. And there's a huge impact on how they grow up to become strong,
smart adults."
Luescher
says that school feeding programs also help protect children from crises --
like droughts, war, or sudden increases in food prices. "School
meals are a way of keeping children in school. It's often the only way that
families can afford to keep their children fed. Sometimes it's the only meal that
some of these children get."
The
big problem, of course, is cost. This is especially true in low-income
countries. However,
the WFP estimates that for every dollar spent on a school meal, countries will
see three dollars in economic returns. Local farmers, for example, can sell
their food to the school meal programs, and the country can build a smarter
workforce. I'm Avi Arditti.
And
I'm June Simms. You are listening to As It Is from VOA Learning
English. Effects
of Childhood Malnutrition Far Reaching and Lasting, about
one-quarter of the world's children may under perform at school because of poor
nutrition. So says a new report from the Britain-based charity Save the
Children.
The "Food for Thought" report says a
malnourished child is almost 20 percent more likely to have trouble reading
than someone of the same age who has a good diet. David
McNair is head of growth, equity and livelihoods at Save the Children UK. "Those
who are malnourished consistently have scored lower on math tests and find it
more difficult to read a simple sentence at age eight. And as they go through
life that affects their confidence, their career aspirations and ultimately
their ability to earn money."
The report is based on an international study of
childhood poverty. Researchers from the University of Oxford are leading the
"Young Lives" study. They are following the lives of 12,000 children
in Ethiopia, India, Peru, and Vietnam over a 15-year period. The
report notes that the period from when a woman becomes pregnant until a child
is two years old is an important time for brain development. But McNair says
the effect of malnutrition goes beyond the biology of the brain.
"There
is interesting evidence on the stimulus that children receive. So because
children who are malnourished look smaller, their parents and their caregivers
tend to treat them as if they were younger than they are. And that means they
do not get the right stimulus and their brains are not developing as a result
of that stimulus." The
report says childhood malnutrition is also a major threat to the long-term
economic growth of many developing countries.
United
Nations figures suggest that last year nearly 50 percent of children under five
in southern Asia were stunted, too short for their age because of poor
nutrition. This was also the case for 40 percent of children under five in
sub-Saharan Africa. Save
the Children predicts that malnourished children may, as adults, earn 20
percent less than children who were properly fed. It says this costs the global
economy more than $100 billion a year.
McNair
says targeting malnutrition now will have major long-term effects. But,
currently nutrition programs get just over 0.3 percent of global development
spending. Save the Children wants spending on nutrition to more than double to
$1 billion a year. Earlier
this week, the British and Brazilian governments held the first-ever high-level
nutrition pledging conference. They say it is a first step in moving
malnutrition to a higher level as an important economic and social development
issue. VOA World News is
coming up at the beginning of the hour Universal Time.
School Lunch Important for Health and
Education
2013 - 6 – 9
Vocabulary
Vocabulary
|
Pronunciation
|
Meaning
|
Estimate (v)
|
/ˈɛstəˌmeɪt/
|
ประเมิน ประมาณ
[often
passive] to form an idea of the cost, size, value, etc. of something, but
without calculating it exactly
Ex:
The deal is estimated to be worth around $1.5 million.
|
Drought (n)
|
/draʊt/
|
ภัยแล้ง
a
long period of time when there is little or no rain
Ex:
The country's entire grain harvest has been hit by drought.
|
Malnourished
(adj.)
|
/ˌmælˈnərɪʃt/
|
เกี่ยวกับโรคขาดสารอาหาร
in bad health
because of a lack of food or a lack of the right type of food
Ex:
Tired, malnourished people are prone to infection.
|
Malnutrition
(n)
|
/ˌmælnuˈtrɪʃn/
|
การขาดแคลนอาหาร
a
poor condition of health caused by a lack of food or a lack of the right type
of food
|
Threat (n)
|
/θrɛt/
|
การคุกคาม
A person or
thing that is likely to cause trouble, danger, etc.
Ex: He is
unlikely to be a threat to the Spanish player in the final.
|
Reference:
Head writer. School
Lunch Important for Health and Education.
voa-201369103903.html
(On June 23, 2013).