Carbohydrates: Math Lesson
Wrap-up
Carefully reading the numbers of food labels and learning vocabulary for units of measure (such as grams, milligrams, kilograms) helps us make decisions about the types and amounts of food to eat for a healthy diet. It also allows us to practice skills—such as reading charts, calculating percentages, and working with fractions and decimals—which are useful in all aspects of daily life.
In this lesson you:
- Learned how to read percentages of carbohydrates on different types of charts and graphs
- Found the amount of carbohydrates on the Nutrition Facts table
- Calculated the amount of nutrients in different serving sizes of food
- Learned prefixes used in different units of measurement
On your own:
- Read the labels of your favorite foods. Compare the total carbs, fiber, and other nutrients in 1 serving size of each food.
- Look at the label to find 1 serving size for your favorite food. Measure the amount that you actually eat of that food. How many servings is it? Calculate the total carbs for the number of servings you eat.
- Look through your food labels and find the foods that have the highest ratio of fiber to sugar. What are they? Which foods have a high ratio of sugar to fiber?
- Calculate the percentages of things in your daily life. What percentage of your family is female? What percentage of your monthly income do you spend on food?
- Find and define words that use prefixes such as milli-, centi-, and kilo-. Find For example, how many grams do you think are in a decagram?