Breakfast Helps Children’s Academic Performance

Report Shows Eating Breakfast Helps Children’s Academic Performance

23 May 2007, embargoed to 9am

Eating breakfast improves children’s performance at school, a ground-breaking report has found.

Released at the Agencies for Nutrition Action conference being held this week in Rotorua, the report found there was considerable evidence that regular breakfast consumption improved academic performance.

Report co-author Robert Scragg said thirteen of fifteen studies showed regular breakfast consumption was associated with improved academic performance. No studies showed regular breakfast consumption was associated with impaired academic performance.

“The benefit appears to be greater for mathematics than for other subjects such as reading or spelling.

“Teachers have been saying for years that students who come to school without breakfast perform less well. This study backs that up.”

The report, which was developed after an extensive literature search, also found many New Zealand children were not eating breakfast. “Overall, 23 percent of Maori, 41 percent of Pacific and 8 percent of New Zealand European and other nationalities did not eat breakfast. This equates to approximately 83,000 children each day,” said report co-author Rob Quigley.

He said breakfast cereals directly marketed to children represented poor nutrition choices and were more like candy than cereal because of their high sugar, fat and salt content.

“Even when you add trim milk, these candy-cereals are not recommended. However, despite this marketing offensive, many parents and children are regularly making good breakfast choices such as weetbix-type cereals and toast.”

Report co-author Rachael Taylor said children who regularly ate breakfast had better nutrient intakes than non-breakfast eaters, such as energy, fibre, calcium and iron. Regarding the effect of breakfast on children’s weight, she said the evidence was mixed, with higher quality studies not supporting the idea that skipping breakfast promotes weight gain.

The study’s authors are calling for information about the importance of eating breakfast to be disseminated widely to parents and schools.

“It is really important that parents provide healthy food for their children’s breakfast and encourage them to eat breakfast. Taking time to prepare breakfast together and sit down as a family to eat can help with this,” Rob Quigley said.

“The Ministries of Education and Health, SPARC and other related government agencies should support schools’ efforts to develop resources aimed at improving breakfast intake in school children, as this supports parents with their good efforts.

“Leftovers from the night before, wholegrain breakfast cereals low in sugar with trim milk, wholemeal toast and/or porridge, fruit, and trim milk drinks are all good options for breakfast.”

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