Sweet Drink Demonstration
Sweet drink demonstrations can help students and parents make healthier drink choices
and encourage children to ‘Tap into water everyday’ instead of consuming of sweet drinks.
These demonstrations can be shown at school assemblies, in classrooms, as homework
tasks, at parent forums or just for fun.
Quick Facts: Water
Cola Soft Drink Demonstration
Ingredients
1. Quick Facts: Water and Sweet Drinks
2. A bowl of sugar
3. 375 ml of soda water
4. Vinegar
5. Chocolate or caramel topping
6. Coffee
7. A tall glass or jug
Preparation
Use the Quick Facts as a guide and discuss or ask the students
about:
• Any health problems that they know about from having too much
sugar.
• The benefits of drinking water.
60% of the human body is made up
of water
Allow the students to guess how much sugar is in:
• A bottle of water?
• A can of soft drink (375 ml)?
• A buddy of soft drink (600 ml)?
Lack of water causes dehydration.
This leads to fatigue, headaches and
poorer learning and thinking ability
Method
To make a can of cola soft drink, pour 375 ml soda water into a large
glass or jug. Add 9.5 teaspoons of sugar. Get the children to count out
the teaspoons as you add them. Then add a dash of vinegar (to
represent acid), a dash of topping (to represent flavour and colour)
and a spoon of coffee (to represent caffeine). Make an equal pile of
sugar (9.5 teaspoons) next to the glass or jug
(Note: This is a representation and is not all the real ingredients).
The result
• Discuss with students why soft drink is not a healthy drink choice.
Why would water be a better choice?
• Put healthy drink choices into a broader context, eg healthy
habits, healthy eating, water bottles in classrooms or being a Kids
– ‘Go for your life’ Member.
Water is vital for life
Water is a healthy choice
Drinking water helps us stay cool on
hot days by evaporating from our
bodies as sweat
Water helps our kidneys work to
wash away our body wastes
We need to drink before we get
thirsty and drink more water on hot
days and during sport
Water is cheap
Tap water often contains fluoride for
healthy teeth
Other Sweet Drink Demonstrations
The same type of demonstration can be done for any sweet drinks,
such as flavoured mineral waters, cordials, sports drinks and fruit
drinks (eg Prima’s).
Quick Facts:
Sweet Drinks
To work out how many teaspoons of sugar to add, simply look on the
nutrition panel for the number of grams of sugar per serve.
Approximately 4 grams of sugar = 1 teaspoon
How many teaspoons is in this can of flavoured mineral water?
Nutrition Information
1 serve = 375 ml can
ENERGY
PROTEIN
CARBOHYDRATE
- Total
- Sugars
Per serve
780kj
0.0g
1.1g
44g
Per 100g
320kj
3.3g
44g sugar
3.0g
per 375 ml
1.1g
can
With 44g of sugar per serve, this means there are 11 teaspoons of
sugar in each can!!
Sweet drinks are those with high levels
of sugar. They include soft drinks,
flavoured mineral water, cordials, most
sports drinks, fruit juice drinks,
flavoured milks and 100% fruit juice
A 375 ml can of soft drink contains
about 10 teaspoons of sugar
Sweet drinks can cause tooth decay
and dental caries
Sweet drinks can cause dehydration
Fruit Juice Demonstration
100 % fruit juice provides vitamins and minerals but should be
served in small quantities due to its high sugar content. There are
two key messages that can be promoted through fruit juice
demonstrations:
1. Fruit juice is high in sugars – even though they are natural
sugars.
Look at the number of grams of sugar on the bottle or carton and
calculate the number of teaspoons of sugar. Count out the
teaspoons of sugar as with the soft drink demonstration.
To reduce the amount of sugars consumed from fruit juice:
• Fruit juice can be diluted 50-50 with water
• Servings can be kept small.
• Include no more than one small serve per day.
2. Eat fruit rather than drink it.
• See how many oranges it takes to fill up a glass of orange
juice.
• Ask the students which would be more filling? What are the
benefits of eating fruit compared to drinking fruit juice?
Sweet drinks can replace nutritious
foods
Sweet drinks are expensive. Instead of
buying a can a day for a year you could
fly to Movieworld in Queensland, buy
an ipod, a bike, rollerblades or
skateboard, see 3 movies, go to the
aquarium and visit the zoo. What would
you do with $760?
Sweet drinks are one of the biggest risk
factors for children becoming above a
healthy weight
100% fruit juice has vitamins and
minerals but also has high sugar
content from the natural fruit sugars.
These cause the same types of
problems as other sweet drinks
It is better to eat fruit rather than drink it
as fills you up and includes the
goodness of fibre
Thank you to Dental Health Services Victoria and Doutta Gala Community Health for assistance in developing this resource.