The Impact Of Balanced Diet On Child Growth And Development

ABSTRACT

i study was carried out in 30 pre-schools in Homa Bay district in Kenya in

)tember 2009. The purpose of the study was to investigate the impact of

lanced diet in mental growth and development of a child below six years. The

1ya Ministry of Education records show that, Homa Bay district had a total of

l Early Childhood Education Centres (DICECE). Most of the centres were

ached to public primary schools. Others were privately owned. The pre-school

led represent 20 percent of the schools.

i Early Childhood Development and Education (ECDE) study, collected data

77 many sources and used different data collection techniques - both

antitative and qualitative.

iii questionnaires were prepared, printed and taken to pre-schools where they

re used to collect raw data from pre-school teachers who dealt directly with

Jng children in their learning centres. In depth interviews were used to collect

ta from nutrition technicians and parents in the area of study. In some cases,

~ct observation of children who were suffering from malnutrition was done

ring the visits.

, study established that, most of the poorly performing children were seriously

::Jer fed. They were intellectually inferior as compared to their peers. Early

asation of breast feeding, hunger and starvation, overdependence on

rbohydrates, were cited as the main causes of this problem. Children in this

tegory came from poor families with very low incomes.

)St pre-schools attached to public primary schools had no feeding

)gramme. Such schools were overenrolled with very many pupils. Most of the

pils looked very weak. Their performance in class also reflected a lot of

,aknesses. Fighting, crying, thumb sucking, absentism was very common. Their

rformance was generally poor.