5 Energy Balance A. Learning Objective Energy is found in all foods. We need energy to help us grow, exercise, think and even sleep.
Some foods are high in energy and others are low in energy.
We must learn how to balance the energy that is found in different foods, so that we are getting just the right amount of energy and all the nutrients we need for health. B. Lesson Plan Explain to the children that good diets have plenty of energy from a wide variety of different sources - some fats, some simple sugars and lots of complex starchy carbohydrates. Protein that is not used up for growth and repair is usually turned into energy for the body to use. If we didn't have enough energy in our diets we would start to feel tired and listless. Diets low in energy are often low in nutrients too, so we might not be able to concentrate as hard at school, play and run at break-times or feel as well as we would want if we ate a diet that didn't supply us with enough energy.