Simple Sugars
Today’s lesson introduced and reviewed many different types of sugars including artificial substitutes, and explained how sugars are broken down and used by the body. Our discussion was centered on simple sugars. Simple sugars include glucose and fructose, sucrose and lactose.
Because carbohydrate foods that we eat must be broken down into glucose before they can be used as fuel by our bodies, we spent time discussing glucose. It is important to try to consume foods that supply the brain with a constant supply of glucose rather than glucose spikes (large amounts at one time). To know what foods supply a constant supply of glucose one can use the glycemic index (G.I.) which is a measure of how fast the food is converted to glucose and released into the blood stream. The lower the G.I., the slower glucose is released and the better the food is to eat. Students found it interesting to learn about the glycemic index and were surprised at all the dangerous side effects of eating excessive amounts of foods rich in high G.I. substances, including obesity, dental cavities, and type II diabetes.
Our learning activity was to subjectively test the relative sweetness of several natural and artificial sweeteners, including maltitol, sucrose, molasses, maple syrup, honey, saccharin, aspartame, stevia leaf extract and table sugar.
The students really enjoyed this sweet lab!
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