Level of daily physical activity and eating habits among school children aged between 10 and 13 years in the city Leopoldina-MG

Abstract

The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the level of physical activity and feeding habits of children aged 10 to 13 years at a public school and a private school in the city of Leopoldina, Minas Gerais. Materials and Methods: The study included 53 children, 33 from private schools and 20 public schools aged between 10-13 years. Collections weight, height and BMI calculations later and percentiles were performed. QuestionnairesPAC-c to check the level of physical activity, and a weekly frequency of food questionnaire to verify the feeding habits of schoolchildren were also applied. Results: One can observe significant differences between public and private schools where publicshowed higher weight value(49.78 ± 12.0 vs. 36.59 ± 9.0) kg, height (155.80 ± 1.0 versus 142.00 ± 1.0) cm, BMI (20.28 ± 4.5 versus 18.03± 3.4) kg/m2 and percentile (69.42 ± 31.90 versus 59.90 ± 31.01). As for the PAC -c, the values were notstatistically different (2.19 ± 0.65 versus 2.82 ± 0.53). For the weekly frequency of food questionnaire, even with different preferences in diverse issues, it was noted that both schools have negative feeding habits. Conclusion : Regarding the level of physical activity , both schools , public and private were classified as sedentary with slight advantage to private school approached the rating of moderately active . BMI percentile and were within recommended for both groups with values slightly lower for private school maybe because of the age and height and / or the small difference in levels of physical activity classifications. To feed frequency observed differences between the responses, however both groups reported not very positive habits.