Use MyFitnessPal's Barcode Scanner in Classroom Calorie Calculation

Earlier this school year I wrote about my love for MyFitnessPal.com, especially after the not-so-conveniently timed federal government shutdown.

If you can believe it, I love this app even more today!

My Bakery students are in the throws of their Create Your Own Quickbread project and made their first draft muffin today.  While the muffins baked students were to calculate unit cost, calorie count, and Healthy Kids viability.

One group was short a person so they did not want to leave their oven to go to the media center. Instead they attempted to use MyFitnessPal on their phone. A senior in my class had the app on her cell phone because she has to track her food and activity for a health class. I knew there was a way to enter recipe information on the app but I assumed it would be tedious compared to a computer.

That I was before I knew.... drum roll... that a BAR CODE SCANNER existed. No amount of capital letters and exclamation points can account for the happy dance I did around my classroom.  It made calculating calories so EASY! Instead of searching... and searching... and searching for the closest ingredient, students could scan my ingredients and enter in the exact information.

I am so happy with the bar code scanner that I may be using MyFitnessPal more often in both class activities and in my personal life.