The ins and outs

Today I got to interact with several customers. Each day I'm surprised at all the services that HyVee offers to its customers. They not only provide healthy food selections to their customers but they also provide various solutions to help with weight loss, low cholesterol, diabetes and several other services. I also got the chance to visit with the store managers and also visit the back room where the food and things are kept. There are several operations needed to make the store run successfully. Today I also am preparing for a health and exercise presentation to the Girl Scouts for tomorrow. I am excited!

Cooking Class, Yum Yum!

Each day at HyVee brings a new aspect of what the store offers to its customer. At the end of my first week, I had already been apart of many different projects. To sum up the end of a great week, HyVee offers a free cooking class to its customers. This weeks cooking class was turkey burgers and whey protein smoothies. The store Chef, Chef William and Stephanie the dietitian does a presentation on how to cook by actually demonstrating the cooking. Participants are also invited to sample what is prepared.
I was intrigued by the participation, there were about 15 people registered to attend the cooking class. I was able to talk to participants and get a feel for why they participated in the class. Some people need to adjust their eating style for health reasons and some could only eat certain types of food and wanted to see a demonstration of how to cook those foods. I have to say it was great to see customers from all walks of life interact and come together to discuss their different eating habits. The aspect of science is something we often dont think about which is that one of the best ways to find to something new is to actual communicate and work with others. I feel that the cooking class that HyVee offers gives customers that opportunity.

Sugar Activity and NuVal Score

Today Stephanie and I worked together putting the health presentation together for the Girl Scouts for next week. We decided to focus on sugar intake. I helped to put together a sugar cube activity using sugar cubes to measure the amount of sugar in several different "kid friendly" foods or foods that many kids like to eat. The purpose of the actitivty is to show kids how much sugar are in foods and why it is important not to eat too much sugar. Im going to enjoy participating in thsi activity.

I also learned about Nutrition Value scorces. This is a feature that HyVee stores have on many of not all of their food products. It gives a nutrional score to each item between 1 and 100. The higher the score the more nutrisous the food is. For example an apple is 100 while some 100% apple juices are a 4. I went around the store viewing the scorces and was really intrigued by this! I also was able to meet some of the health food managers and learn a little about what they do.

Day 2 Getting Started

After my first day yesterday, I have much clearer vision of what I would like to accomplish during this externship and some of the projects that I will be working on. I have a project due next week putting together a two-hour presentation for the Girl Scouts of America. I'm excited and look forward to getting started on my projects!

My first Day

After alot of searching and wishful thinking I was able to secure an externship. Horray! I was very fortunate to have the help of dedicated members of the IMSEP program working hard to help me find a match this summer.

As a special needs teacher I teach all subjects including mathematics and science. I decided to join the IMSEP because I wanted to know more about science content and how it is used in real world context. I am pleased to be working with Stephanie at HyVee Food Stores. Stephanie is a registerd dietician and works in all aspects of health through the store. It is funny that I literally met Stephanie yesterday and started my externship today but I have already learned so much! Today Stephanie and I discussed more aspects of her job and the different events that she speaks at catered to helping people understnad their health. I am excited to start putting together a health program for Stephanie next week to teach to k-5 Girl Scouts (right up my alley) This week I will also be helping to teach a healthy cooking class as well as attending a frutose intolereance support group meeting, I was intrigued to find out that that disease even existed! It will prove to be an fun and enlightening week for me. I am excited to be apart of this externship opportunity!