What to read after Eat Well & Keep Moving?

With childhood obesity and type 2 diabetes on the rise, many curricula have been developed in recent years to promote child health. But all take a back seat to Eat Well & Keep Moving, Second Edition. This skill-building approach to motivating upper-elementary students to eat better and stay active began as a joint research project between the Harvard School of Public Health and Baltimore Public Schools. Today the program is used in all 50 states and more than 20 countries, and it won the Dannon Institute Award for Excellence in Community Nutrition in 2000.

Eat Well & Keep Moving, Second Edition, is a comprehensive, multifaceted program that encompasses the classroom, the cafeteria, and the gymnasium and includes tools to involve the family and the community. This program differs from most in that it addresses nutrition and physical activity simultaneously. And it's proven to be effective at combating a major factor related to childhood obesity: too much time in front of the TV screen. In extensive field tests among students and teachers using the program, children ate more fruits and vegetables, reduced their intake of saturated and total fat, watched less TV, and improved their knowledge of nutrition and physical activity. The program is also well liked by teachers and students.

The program uses existing school resources, fits within most school curricula, promotes literacy across disciplines, contains camera-ready teaching materials, and is inexpensive to implement. You can integrate the lesson plans into core subject areas--for example, you can teach nutrition and physical activity in math, language arts, and science classes. You can easily incorporate the materials into any class you teach, regardless of your current knowledge of health topics.

The six components of the program--classroom education, physical education, school-wide promotional campaigns, food service, staff wellness, and parent involvement--work together to create a supportive learning environment that promotes learning of lifelong good habits. With this complete resource, you can teach students about nutrition and fitness in your classroom--and launch an effective school-wide program if you desire to. Eat Well & Keep Moving can also be part of your school's efforts to meet federally mandated school wellness policies.

With Eat Well & Keep Moving, Second Edition, you get
-46 lesson plans and microunits;
-a CD-ROM from which you can print lessons, units, and over 300 ready-to-use worksheets;
-fun and engaging school-wide campaigns to encourage kids to walk, watch less TV and reduce other screen time, and eat more fruits and vegetables;
-FitCheck, a self-assessment tool to help students track their activity levels; and
-access to the companion Web site

This new edition of Eat Well & Keep Moving incorporates the latest federal recommendations from the 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. It also features two new lessons on consumption of sugary beverages, a key determinant of childhood overweight. The CD-ROM contains manuals and training materials for teachers and school food service staff in both text and PowerPoint presentation formats. In addition, it provides guidance on involving parents and the community, an extensive list of Web-based resources, and a wealth of ready-to-use teaching materials to promote children's health.

You can be confident that when you use Eat Well & Keep Moving, Second Edition, and the new materials, you will equip your students with the knowledge, skills, and supportive environment they need in order to lead more healthful lives by choosing nutritious diets and being physically active.