Tag: school

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Regular Physical Exercise Makes You Smart and Healthy

One step at a time. (Dr. Noorali Bharwani)
One step at a time. (Dr. Noorali Bharwani)

Who wouldn’t like to be smart and healthy?

An article in the Scientific American Mind (July/August 2009), titled “Fit Body, Fit Mind?” says your workout makes you smarter and you stay sharp into old age.

“We are used to thinking of intelligence as largely a matter of genetic inheritance, but that is not the whole picture. What you do affects your mental wellbeing: staying physically and mentally active helps us stay sharp as we age,” says the article. Your brain and body – either use it or lose it.

A review of dozens of studies shows that maintaining a mental edge requires more. Other things you do – including participating in activities that make you think, getting regular exercise, staying socially engaged and even having a positive attitude – have a meaningful influence on how effective your cognitive functioning will be in old age, says the article.

Sometime ago, researchers from Denver presented their research at the annual meeting of the Pediatric Academic Societies. Their conclusion: being more physically fit means kids will do better in school. They found that this can be achieved by increasing school’s physical education program to 40 minutes a day, five days a week, from 40 minutes once a week. The performance improved by about 70 per cent. Amazing!

A healthy and smart child will one day become a parent and hopefully instill the same kind of healthy attitude to the future generations. A person can workout at school, at a public or private gym or at home.

To be smart and healthy one has to have enough sleep everyday. Sleep scientists say that we need one hour of sleep for every two we stay alert. This allows the brain to regenerate and repair itself. A student needs that to stay fresh and study more. A good night’s sleep also makes driving safe.

To be smart, a student has to study. Without studying you don’t get the grades. So how many hours should one study? That requires time management skills. We all have 168 hours in a week to use as we wish. Common sense says that more time you spend studying better your academic performance will be.

Most universities recommend that students study at least two hours outside of class for every hour spent in class, although some recommend even more.

Finally, boost your memory and brainpower with healthy food like fruits, vegetables and fish.

It is not difficult to be healthy, happy and smart. Mental and physical power depends on how much time and effort we put into it. Have fun.

Start reading the preview of my book A Doctor's Journey for free on Amazon. Available on Kindle for $2.99!

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How Schools Teach our Children to be Fat

A beautiful view of the mountains in Canmore, Alberta. (Dr. Noorali Bharwani)
A beautiful view of the mountains in Canmore, Alberta. (Dr. Noorali Bharwani)

“Our children are getting fatter. They eat more and move less,” says Diane Kelsall, MD, deputy editor, Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ April 7, 2015), in an editorial titled, “How schools teach our children to be fat.”

The editorial goes on to say that nearly 85 per cent of children aged three to four years meet activity levels recommended in Canadian guidelines, but this falls to only four per cent in teens.

Unfortunately, most of our overweight or obese children will not outgrow their weight problem. That means they develop adult diseases like hypertension and diabetes. And our schools hinder the fight against obesity in our youth, says the editorial.

If you look at a typical day for our children when they are at school then you will understand why Dr. Kelsall feels our schools are doing a poor job of preventing obesity. She makes the following points:

  • Our children’s school day starts early, often well before 9 am.
  • They are likely driven or take the bus to school.
  • They are tired when they arrive and sit for most of the day.
  • Physical education classes are usually not required after grade nine.
  • Lunch may be rushed, and food options available in the school may be high in fat or sugar.
  • At lunch or after classes, some students may participate in sports, but most don’t.
  • Students have hours of homework resulting in extended screen time.
  • They go to bed late, and the cycle starts all over again.

No wonder nearly one-third of our school-aged children are overweight or obese. Our schools should be helping our children to be healthy and that should lead to healthy adulthood. How can schools do that? Dr. Kelsall suggests the following:

  • Daily exercise should be mandatory for all school children. It should become part of daily life. Classes should include enough sustained, vigorous exercise to help students meet recommended activity levels, rather than the 20-minute requirement in some jurisdictions.
  • Walking or cycling to school is a good start.
  • Taking public transportation affords more opportunity for exercise than being driven by parents.

Lengthy sitting time has been shown to be a risk factor for early death in adults. The editorial says that a peek into most high school classrooms will show rows of students sitting for classes that are often 75 minutes in length, among the longest in the world. This sends the message that being sedentary is acceptable. Beyond physical education classes, getting students moving during school hours takes creativity.

We should do what Japan does. Make food education a part of the compulsory curriculum. We should encourage our kids to sleep early and get up early. Like adults, tired adolescents are at increased risk of obesity.

“Obesity is a complex disease and prevention requires multilevel intervention,” says Dr. Kelsall. It starts with the individual and family making good choices around exercise and food intake, but broader societal support is necessary. Our battle against smoking is slowly winning and message to people is clear – if you smoke then you kill yourself and hurt others. The message for obesity and overeating is the same – stop hurting yourself and the people you love.

Start reading the preview of my book A Doctor's Journey for free on Amazon. Available on Kindle for $2.99!

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Physically Active Children Have Higher Scholastic Achievements

In the last column, we discussed how regular exercise benefits adult brain. Today, we will focus on the importance of exercise for school children to boost their brain power.

These days, it is sad to note, when the education system is hit with cutbacks, one of the first programs to suffer is the physical education program. In Canada, we are also at the mercy of the unpredictable weather which hinders children’s outdoor activities.

We can always talk about the good old days. I was brought up in a country where our outdoor activities were not hampered by the vagaries of the weather nor country’s economic situation. Tanzania (then Tanganyika) was under the British rule and life those days was comfortably slow.

We would start the day at school with one hour of physical activity outdoors. After school we would have another hour or two of sporting activities involving different teams. Now the reality is, we can pine for those days but they isn’t coming back. We now live in a different kind of world where economic realities trump all other considerations.

We, as teachers and parents, owe it to our children to provide them with time, facilities and financial support for an hour or two of physical activity on a daily basis. This will not only boost their brain power, it will also act as an antidote for obesity and poor health. Developmental psychologists have suggested that in young children there is a link between physical and mental growth.

An article in the Scientific American Mind (September/October 2010) by Steve Ayan, a psychologist, makes three important points about the academic athletes:

-Students who are fit – based on their high aerobic capacity and low body fat – also tend to perform well in school and on standardized tests.
-In addition to regular exercise, brief periods of movement such as jumping or stretching can help improve children’s concentration.
-Exercise may turbocharge the brain by raising levels of neuronal growth factors, which foster the formation of new connections between brain cells.

Ayan’s conclusions are based on several studies quoted in his article. A review of about dozen articles done by psychologist Charles H. Hillman in 2008 revealed that children and teenagers with higher level of aerobic fitness – but not muscle strength or flexibility – were associated with better performance in school and on standardized tests.

That means, if the young person is more physically fit then more likely he or she will attain higher grades. This connection holds well from elementary school to college. Being fit at age 18 was correlated with a higher level of scholarly achievement in later life, says Ayan.

In a review of 17 studies from 2008, scientists from Universities of Quebec and Toronto concluded that reserving up to an hour a day for physical activity in school curriculums does not detract from academic achievement. “To the contrary, they noted that more exercise often improved school performance, despite the time it took away from reading, writing and arithmetic,” says Ayan.

Teachers and parents should recognize that physical education is about building the brain as well as body. Ayan concludes by saying, “If teachers want their students to pay attention, they should consider letting them jump, stomp and bend their bodies regularly during the school day. Most children have a natural inclination to move, so all the adults have to do is get out of their way.”

A very sensible advice.

Start reading the preview of my book A Doctor's Journey for free on Amazon. Available on Kindle for $2.99!

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Does exercise make you smart and smarter?

The summer holidays are over. Children are back to school. Parents are back to work and I am back to writing.

Today, we will explore studies which show that people who do regular physical exercise improve their brain power and can improve their chances of avoiding dementia and cognitive impairment. Whatever the age of the person, physical exercise is critical to vigorous mental health.

How do we define cognitive function?

From birth to old age we have a capacity for cognitive function. That means each person is capable of learning or remembering a certain amount of information. During early childhood, most people are best able to absorb and use new information, with most children learning new words, concepts and ways to express themselves. This capacity to learn slows down gradually as we get older.

Cognitive function involves mental process of perception, thinking, reasoning and remembering. Studies done on individuals over the age of 65 have shown that individuals who undergo cognitive training show substantial benefits and these benefits last for many years.

In a study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society (2010), author Dr. Laura E. Middleton suggests that early life physical activity is important to late-life health and in particular in preventing late-life cognitive impairment. The sooner you start being physically active, the better it is.

The study suggest that those who took up regular exercise as young adults were 30 per cent less likely to suffer late-life cognitive impairment compared with women who remained sedentary. This study looked at the physical activity levels of 9,000 women at various ages, from adolescence to senior years.

Physical activity can help the brain build new connections and repair itself, can increase overall brain volume and build enough mental reserves to compensate for the loss of brain power as we age.

An article in the Scientific American Mind (July/August 2009), titled Fit Body, Fit Mind? says your workout makes you smarter and you stay sharp into old age.

“We are used to thinking of intelligence as largely a matter of genetic inheritance, but that is not the whole picture. What you do affects your mental well-being: staying physically and mentally active helps us stay sharp as we age,” says the article.

Although the idea of exercising cognitive machinery by performing mentally demanding activities – popularly termed the “use it or lose it” hypothesis – is better known, a review of dozens of studies shows that maintaining a mental edge requires more than that. Other things you do – including participating in activities that make you think, getting regular exercise, staying socially engaged and even having a positive attitude – have a meaningful influence on how effective your cognitive functioning will be in old age, says the Scientific American Mind article.

As we age, we have an increased desire to be independent in everything we do. If we are able to maintain our cognitive function then we can enhance our quality of life for many years without having to rely on others. For this we have to prepare from a very early age. At an age when we think nothing can ever go wrong in our minds or bodies.

Studies have shown that most active women had a 30 per cent lower risk of cognitive decline. Walking distance was related to cognition but walking speed was not. Even moderate levels of physical activity can serve to limit declines in cognition in older adults. Some studies show aerobic exercise may be the real key to brain fitness and also helps with circulatory system.

The message is clear: if you want to be smart and stay smart into old age then start exercising early in life and make it a lifelong habit.

Start reading the preview of my book A Doctor's Journey for free on Amazon. Available on Kindle for $2.99!