Internship Global Nutrition & Health 2013

My 4th Semester Internship Blog

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My Morning Work Out with a Kindergarten :-)

On my morning runs in Søndermarken I usually stop at the out door training post/playground to do some core and strength training.

Today I was accompanied by a kindergarten, which was out in Søndermarken to play in the sun and have their lunch on the grass.

Little by little, more and more kids approached asking if they could join me in my training. So I ended up with my own little gym class :) We jumped on the trampolines, did somersault on the training bars, chest push-ups and triceps push-ups.

They were so sweet, and made my training routine so much more fun, and they asked if I was coming back again tomorrow to train with them. A great way to start the day off.

I haven't really thought so much about it, since I stopped working with children after many years, but today I felt how I’ve actually missed that part of me and also the joy kids give you.

Of course it has to be said, that working with children many hours each day in comparison to spending half an hour with them free of choice + getting all that love and attention being a new face, is not the same thing. Nonetheless, they really made my day! :)

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Support each other☝

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Everything counts. Even the small stuff has a huge impact on your well-being later on in life.

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Mindfulness I believe it’s callled - nevertheless, I try to keep these words in mind, when old destructive behavior comes a-knocking 👋

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Circle training in Fitness World 💪 Great initiative! A bunch of different gym machines, that touches all mayor muscle groups, are centered around the green “Cirkeltræning” sticker - This is great for anyone who wants to get toned and fit, without having to put a lot of thought into it. It’s right there already constructed for you. On each machine there’s a sticker, telling you how to do the workout movements right, to not hurt yourself, and make sure you use the right muscle group 👍

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Words of the day! ✌

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Søndermarken running track and outdoor gym. Great alternative for exercise when the weather invites you out into the blue. ☀😎

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Gay marriages are finally legalized in France. Congrats! 👍✌👬👭

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Healthy-ish Friday snack at Dyssengårdsskolens GFO:

Pic #1, Avocado/coco oil/whole grain flour/dark choco-chunk/honey COOKIES! - and some cane sugar (but not necessary in my opinion)

Pic #2, is whole grain/oatmeal buns with plain cinnamon on top. The kids loved it! They thought it was cinnamon-sugar.. Haha.. How that sweet cinnamon smell can trick u 😜

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“Hygge”/Snacktime at Dyssegårdsskolens GFO:

Quinoa-frikadeller (“meat balls”) & råkost (grated carrots, apples, pears, orange pieces and orange juice) + broccoli and cucumber bits 🍴😁

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Air tracking at Dyssegårdsskolen GFO 🏃👍

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First picnic of the year ☀ A lil chilly, but like a true Dane u must take advantage of every little vitamin D u can get! U never know how long it’ll last ☔

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Professional Study Issues or Research Questions

Ehm.. I am a person of very poor imagination. 1 thing I would like to talk to the head board of Dyssegårdsskolen is the poor kitchen equipment. Gentofte kommune (I guess you can compare it to ‘county’ but a lot smaller) is one of Denmark’s richest and that shows when looking upon Dyssegårdsskolen & GFO. They have the newest technology - laptops, whiteboards, touchscreen computers; big bright classrooms with nice interior; a lot of space and equipment for doing activities; a fountain with cooled water for the children - They even have an app for the parents’ smartphones so they can check their children’s whereabouts at all times!!

They have health educated staff and get fresh groceries every week, BUT they have no proper kitchen knives; a microwave that hardly heats your meal and only 4 small ceramic hobs for cooking! - and not the kind with ‘induction’ were things get super hot super fast - more like things-get-super-slowly-heated-but-burned-at-the-bottom-of-the-pot kinda hobs.

I do not know if they are simply not aware of the poor kitchen standard there is, in comparison to the rest of the building, or if they are knowingly choosing not to spent money on it! Anyhow, this is a matter worth pointing out to them.

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Tasks & Survival Tips for Others

You will not have any trouble surviving at Dyssegårdsskolens GFO. They are very easygoing, well informed and educated in health related issues and open minded when it comes to letting you live out the goals you set for yourself. I would say, as long as you have some good objectives that keeps you on the right path, you are good to go! 

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Relevance & Professionalism

I have been blogging a lot about the relevance of the internship and how it in many ways touched areas of our interests - the reason I am writing this in plural is because Lindsey (my fellow classmate and -internee) and I have been setting goals and working together through out the internship period.

A shout out to Lindsey Bülow Gonterman for great team work and support.

Our internship supervisor and mentor is educated in nutrition & heath at Metropol, herself, back when it was known as Shurs Seminarium. The coordinator of our department is educated in sports-psychology and is in charge (among others) of the fun and games in the gym halls.

As you can see they already had everything pretty much down, which was fantastic to witness, and which made it easy for us to get excepted into being a part of the staff.

One thing I definitely want to improve with respect to professional relevance is doing calculations. Making a scheduled diet plan for a client; learning how to master the xl-word-computer-program (I sound like a computer cripple, I know); making graphs and such.

It was not of importance at my internship at Dyssegårdsskiolens GFO, but it is a personal wish of mine to get better in these areas - whether it is a realistic one or not :-P

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How to Apply Classroom Knowledge to Internship

Looking back on the objectives Lindsey Bülow Gonterman and I set for ourselves before the internship started, I am happy to realize that we have touched all areas to some depth.

We have used our educational background in the communication process with the children and the staff. We have taught the children about the qualities of certain vitamins and about plant-protein. In the relay races we have experienced how some external factors seem to awaken inner-motivation and self-confidence within the children and the importance of the adult participating in the activities, instead of being passively observing - practice what you preach, right?

Taste classes inspired by the Sapere Methode, when cooking, have proven very fruitful when getting children to try out new foods and flavors. We hope and wish to have ‘created’ at least a couple of small opinion leaders, who will go home with a fresh and open mind towards tasting things that are not already within their comfort-zone, with the recipes we have given them and an eagerness to show their families what they have learned - and thereby ‘creating’ big parental opinion followers!  :) :) :) 

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A (Specific) Challenge

We have had some obstacles along the way. First off, we have not visually documented our activities at Dyssegårdsskolen, to maintain the privacy and integrity of the people involved.

Secondly, the kitchen equipment seemed inadequate at times. The stove was a small ceramic one - the kinds designed for an at home kitchen. Imagine having to make a stew of some kind, in a LARGE pot that does not fit any of the cooking hobs, for a 100+ people! We either ended up serving the stew undercooked or an hour too late, resulting in a lot of the children had gone home by then.

But!! The biggest challenge has been the “Lock Out” of all teachers. During the past couple of weeks the number of children at the GFO has varied from 20-70 children. As the milk (the children get served at lunch time) is pre-ordered and pre-payed for, we ended up with waaaaay to much milk!! So the nice meal-hygge-plan we had planned went out the window, because we needed to use all that milk, so it would not go to waste.

So we did not order any groceries, because the head office told us to use the milk and avoid unnecessary waste. That meant we had to get creative milk-wise. One day we had a x-mas theme. We made ‘risengrød’ (slightly compatible to rice pudding); put out cinnamon for the children to sprinkle on top; cranked up the x-mas jingles and decorated the tables with x-mas table cloths. It was a huge success! Not an innovative food experience, but hey! we used a lot of milk and the audience were very happy.

We also had days of breakfast theme - basically oatmeal and cornflakes with raisins to put on top. Another day we had oven-baked apples with cinnamon as accessory and homemade apple sauce for the oatmeal. Funny enough, these “days of porridge” were among the children’s favorites.

Maybe there is something about warm oatmeal/rice pudding with cinnamon that reminds them of cozy times. Times where it is snowing outside, you are sitting with your family at a candlelit table, in the warm indoors, counting down the days for x-mas eve - or maybe it is the fact that they have different topping they can choose from themselves, that made it so interesting for them! OR maybe both?? Interesting stuff nevertheless!

“Jingle-bells, jingle-bells, jingle all the waaaaay!”