Which of the following do you think is the best way to prevent and/or stop childhood obesity?

I voted more PE classes, however, I think it's more important for parents to get their children away from the television, the video games and all the other sit on your butt to play items and outdoors or enrolled in some sort of activity. Swimming, dancing, karate, baseball, soccer, gymnastics, family games outside... something. Leaving it all up to the schools is ridiculous. As with every other aspect of parenting... ensuring your children are getting exercise and are healthy is first and foremost YOUR responsibility, not that of the schools, the government, or anyone else we generally blame. There simply is no excuse for not making sure your kids are getting exercise, no matter how busy you may be. And lead by example people! Demanding your kids exercise when you whine about having to walk from the back of the parking lot is rather defeating the purpose.

-----
Free books need new home.
~Fallon~

"If I fall asleep with a pen in my hand, don't remove it - I might be writing in my dreams."- Pace
-----

I voted for more PE classes.

However, I think the best way to prevent childhood obesity is to teach a healthy lifestyle overall. Rather than teach about the effects of obesity (because I know so many 5-year-olds are actually going to sit and listen to that), children should be taught how to live a healthy lifestyle and be rewarded for healthy living choices.

I think a combination of more physical activity, combined with nutrition classes throughout school, would be the best means of prevention. With the right person in charge of such a curriculum, parental involvement could easily be included.

This is Why I'm Hot
And My Other Blogs

I don't like this poll, why isn't there the option of "educating the parents"? Honestly, who do you think gives them this food? Or whatever it is that creates obesity these days.

Après la pluie le beau temps. ♥

Drugs!

Kids need physical activity normalized at home. School classes won't do it. That's only an hour a day! They need to come home from school and go outside rather than watching TV or playing on the computer.

http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/ediblewoman

I feel like we are doing enough as is...the rest is up to the kids and the parents. People in this country are so caught up in immediate gratification (fast food, good tasting fatty food) that they don't realize the long term effects of their actions. Sure, I can go down the road 2 minutes to the McDonalds and get a BigMac that will taste awesome, or I could drive the extra 10 minutes to the grocery store to pick up healthy food that will taste decent, but will not cause me to get huge and be unhealthy. People don't see the long term effect of when they become huge and no one wants to look at them. So before we change minor things like more education or more gym classes, we must change the whole American outlook on life and gratification. Who has got the first step?

Kids today just don't get the exercise they did 20 years ago. Now there is just so much technology that kids are spending all of their free time in front of the computer or playing video games. I see very few kids riding bikes and playing ball outside anymore. If kids would start becoming active again, they would be able to burn up the calories they ingest each day.

This will probably sum up what I think about regulating junk food.
Government's role in health and wellness
The kids need to be taught and lead by example and given time to do the right thing. Outside of health class is a vending machine and they just tore the play area down...so the moment they walk into health class they know already that what they are about to be told is a lot of hot air.

Good Night
~T

All truths are easy to understand once discovered; The point is to discover them ~Galileo

I would have voted "other", but chose more PE classes. It's really the parents that are in charge of making the changes. 80-90% of the food a kid eats is provided for by the parents. Parents/relatives are the ones teaching eating habits and positive/negative attitudes towards body image, food, and physical activity. I think eating habits are the biggest contributor towards obesity, even more so than a sedentary life style. There are overweight and obese kids on sports teams. Many kids are taught to "clean their plate" when it should be "eat until you're full". There's also the need to teach to only eat when you're hungry, not when you're sad or bored. All this contributes to obesity.

But healthier school lunches, more recess, and better PE and health classes could only help.

Common sense is as rare as genius. ~Emerson
My Latest Blog Posts

Forcing children to participate in more physical education classes is not a positive way to better the situation (in my opinion of course). I remember loving sports and running around, but I despised PE with every bone and dreaded going. I never tried very hard because it was forced and made unpleasant, especially by those horrid school PE uniforms (among other things).

To make a change the goal would be to up involvement in sports by choice, educating in creative and non-lecture ways about proper food and diet, and limiting access to those foods that are the most processed and contain high fat, sugar, fructose corn syrup and trans fats.

As far as I am concerned the only machine that should be available in schools should be fruit juices, water, teas and lemonade (natural varieties such as Nantuckets). Snacks should be centered on such things as snack bars and fruit snacks, trail mix, peanuts, sunflower seeds, and granola bars (even those covered in chocolate).

There is no problem with allowing kids to have chocolate and sweets, but schools do not regulate these supplies and often kids choose to not have a balanced lunch and instead opt for a snickers and coke.

I like the initiative of getting kids involved in their food choices and supplies from kindergarten. The new wave is to start field trips to local farms and have kids learn to grow their own food. Then these local supplies are used in the schools and the children attach what they learned on the field trip to the food choices they make. There is a certain amount of local pride when they know their next door neighbor picked the apple on their plates.

The main reason kids are addicted to all this crap is because we as a society (including parents, teachers, and everyone else they come in contact with) fail to give them the understanding of a connection between the fields, to their plates, to their digestive system.

Tell them they will hear, show them they will remember, involve them and they will understand.

The Heathen's Guide
LUST (Part I)
LUST (Part II)

.. but instead of the average fare, these extra periods of excercise would be different and more interesting. Have a school offer classes like fencing, dance, or archery, and you'll see more interested students who want to participate.

~ *~
This is a signature, an automated thingy that pops up when I comment, not a demand to see my blog!

Mind Control is Easier Than You Think

I think that if parents were more into pressing the issue of staying physically fit, then there would be less of an obesity problem. However, parents shouldnt be too oppressive. my mom talks about my weight issue in front of my whole family, and every time I put anything besides water, fruit, or vegitables, she says something to the effect of "Did you know that this has X number of calories/carbs/sugar?" it's really embarassing. So, if you are a parent trying to have your kid lose weight, take what I said into consideration.

It up to the parents to keep their kids in shape. Kids shouldnt be allowed t watch TV or play video games all day. And a lot of times, kids look up to their parents. So if the parents lead a healthy lifestyle- being active, not lazy, and eating right- the kids would pick up on that as they grow up.
I voted for educating kids of the effects of obesity. But i think this should happen no earlier than their pre-teen years. Its hard for a child younger then pre teens to think about what their life will be like in the future.

I hesitated to vote regulating food. I think it's important to reduce the influence of soda pop and pure sugar/caffeinated beverages. My dentist has lobbied our local school board for years for a moratorium on cola in the schools. I'm not that radical.

We're not going to solve the obesity problem with only one carrot.

In the end I voted for the campaigns because I think humans are inherently good. When we're taught well, we react. Such a campaign would require intense implementation and supplemental regulation.

If there was an "other" choice I would have picked that. I think parents need to be doing more activites outside with their children instead of letting them watch TV, play on the computer and eat large amounts of food. Junk food is not good for kids but if they are taught by their parents to eat healthy, get exercise, and have good role models to teach then then obesity wouldn't be as bad. I read an article on obesity in children and the rates have dropped.

http://www.progressiveu.org/032913-lupus-uncureable-wait-what
Love comments? I do too!

I voted for the first one, but i would say all of them.

I think a better idea would be to place higher taxes on food stuffs that don't meet certain health criteria and use this to subsidise healthier options.

A big problem in the West, when it comes to healthy eating, is that really healthy options are extortionately expensive when juxtaposed with the junk food available to lower income and even mid-income families.

Placing taxes on junk food, would encourage producers of junkfood to improve the nutritional content of their products and to explore healthier, yet cost effective, alternatives to many of the unhealthy ingredients and processes they currently use. Necessity is the mother of invention after all and I reckon these producers could be pressed to some serious inventing in a health conscious direction if their profit margins are messed with.
_____________________________________________________________
I am the people my mother warned me about.

http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/tuffgong

TUFFGONG
Senior Executive Administrator™

I hesitated when voting because I found it hard to put the blame on schools. Usually healthier eating choices aren't provided until you hit the middle school or even high school level and with lack of funding, cheaper food will be served which is often times unhealthy.

I agree that the main focus should be kept in the home. Parents should try their hardest to get their kids involved in sports and other activities and preach good eating habits. There shouldn't necessarily be a focus on weight and that skinny is good but that being healthy is important.
___________________________________________________________________
"Most intellects do not believe in God, but they fear us just the same." - Erykah Badu

I voted for the campaign, though I'd have preferred 'other'

While I believe it is VERY important to educate about the need for exercise and the wisdom in proper food choices, I think that such campaigns quickly become trendy propaganda machines.

They also tend to lead to mandates and government intervention.

A person has a right to not eat well and to not exercise. It is not the job of the government to tell you what to eat, how to eat it or if/when/how to exercise.

I chose educating children as the best answer, although I think ultimately it is an array of actions needed to help curb the obesity rate in children. First and foremost I turn to the parents. Where are these children learning these bad eating habits? I think it takes a lot more than just junk food available at school to make a child obese. More than likely the child is eating the same junk at home, if they are obese. And a child cannot eat junk food at home if the parents didn't buy it for them. More often than not do I repeatedly see parents taking their kids to McDonald's on a regular basis and giving them candy whenever they whine for it. I know this is not the case for EVERY obese child, but I think it is quite prevalent and we are now seeing the repercussions in our overindulgent society.
We need to teach our kids proper nutrition and keep them activated. This is redundant statement, but is so keenly important. Moreover, we need to lead by example. We can't be pigging out ourselves and expect our children to eat as healthiest as can be. I think we need to take several proactive steps in our children's lives, incorporating our own health/fitness goals into theirs, working together to maintain healthy lifestyles.

Why is there no "keep the government out of it, facist" option?

--Mike

I voted for P.E classes, for various reasons. One being that kids are so ridiculously inactive today (there is a minority of active, driven, artistic kids still hanging on, of course) and really the best way to be a healthy individual is physical activity.

You don't want a bunch of little food-o-phobics (I know an EIGHT year old who is terrified of being obese, and eats salads all day. EIGHT!). I think too much nutrition information will just confuse and maybe obsess kiddos. Can you imagine ten-year-old anorexics? Eek.

And BMI? In school?? How humiliating! That will only turn into a competition of sorts and give even more awful ways to target and harrass heavier, or super skinny, kids.

There shouldn't be crap food in shcools, but give me a break. The entire point of school lunch are those delicious tator tots and frito pies. :) Of course, sald bars are wonderful and there should always be abundant health foods in the cafe.

Anyhoo, the P.E. thing. In my school, P.E. wasn't even mandatory. Creepy. I think it shoulc be, and there should be field days even in middle school (hell, even high school) where they get to run around having fun and goofing off, relaxing a little, being competitive.
My eighth grade lcass was particularilly rowdy, so hey let us have a thirty minute recess every day. When the sports got boring, we brought bongo drums, guitars, egg-shakers, tamborines, etc. and just messed around like little hippies for a while. Both the running-around time and the musical explorations were wonderful for us hyperactive kids.

"Happiness only real when shared".

hit it right on the head. Kids don't pick up healthy lifestyles from PE class or Health Class or any of the other bogus classes currently offered at public school; unless a lot has changed in public school since I graduated seven years ago (whew, has it been that long?)

My mom was the primary reason I learned to live a semi-healthy life. She had me and my sisters help her with a massive vegetable garden every summer, we also helped her preserve and prepare the veggies at meals throughout the year. We also canned peaches, froze massive quantities of peas, butchered roadkill on the kitchen table (usually deer,) tapped maple trees for syrup and where a one-car family the majority of my growing up years, which meant we walked or rode bikes almost everywhere. We also didn't have a TV most of my growing up years, which meant we had to get up and move, or sit and stare at nothing, which is not an option for kids....(I will probably not have a TV when my kids are small, I highly recommend it...dad used to spend tons of time reading to us and making up sound effects and funny voices to go with the stories he read! It was great!)

What can I say? I had exceptionally awesome parents! I wish every kid in the world could have a childhood like that...

Love ya,
Carrot

We need to not only educate the children but also the parents. By getting parents actively involved in their children's lives we could get on only children more physically active and eating healthier, but also parents.