Good News: the US is not the most overweight country in the world. It’s the 9th. The bad news is that 8 of the others in the top 10 are tiny Pacific Island island nations. This means that population-wise we pretty much top (or tip) the list. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) there has been a dramatic increase in obesity in the past 20 years in the US resulting in a 33% adult obesity rate. During that time rates in teens a have tripled to a staggering 18%.
Obesity is defined as having a Body Mass Index (BMI) greater than or equal to 30. BMI is attained through a pretty simple calculation by dividing one’s weight by height squared (normal BMI is 19-25). Obesity is directly linked to heart disease, cancer and diabetes: three of our nation’s most debilitating illnesses. In 2007 $2.26T was spent on health care in the US.
“What gets measured gets managed.” – Dr. Peter Drucker
To tame this highly preventable self-destructive epidemic, children need to be able to track their nutrition metrics using a Food Journal. This can be conducted as the ideal cross-functional science/math class project. Let’s begin by reviewing that a Nutritonal Facts label is required on all pre-packaged foods and depicts numbers of calories and fat grams. It is important to check the amount in a serving as this will mutiply caloric intake.
Once all the calories and percent total fat in a meal are noted they can be tweeted using a synced cell phone. Additionally a predetermined hashtag can 
direct the tweet to a feed where all the entries are recorded chronologically throughout the day. The child will now have a respective list of percent daily value fat and calories which can be added daily to a spreadsheet. Most people need about 2000 calories per day. This varies depending on height, weight, age and gender. The best way to approach this is to ensure caloric balance by minimizing intake if calculated BMI levels are too high.
Shown is a picture of tweets sent as texts from my cellphone. Two pieces of information were recorded from each meal: total calories and percent daily value of fat. These were tracked for 2 weeks. *
Next all of the values were entered into Excel and charted.
Eventually other nutritonal information can be recorded, tracked and pooled using selective hashtags. So that we can be a healthier nation, introduce your iKids to Digital Food Journals using Twitter today!
*Tweets shown were from extended days that aren’t reflected in the charts
