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UCCE helps children eat smart and play hard

The slow and steady effort to reverse the nation’s obesity crisis took a step in the right direction on California’s Central Coast during a six-week pilot project last summer.

After participating in a fun and informative series of classes, a quarter of the participants reported drinking less sports drinks and sodas, and a quarter said they drank more water.

“The obesity crisis crept up on America one step at a time,” said Shirley Peterson, director and nutrition, family and consumer sciences advisor for UC Cooperative Extension in San Luis Obispo County. “We have found another way to begin reversing the trend.”

Peterson learned that six- to eight-year-old children from low-income San Luis Obispo County families had a higher incidence of overweight than the statewide average. She evaluated the nutrition curricula available and settled on the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s “Eat Smart. Play Hard.” Peterson modified the curriculum into six lessons to be presented one evening a week for six weeks.

“The USDA had a lot of materials available that would appeal to six- to eight-year-olds, the age group I wanted to work with. They had the stickers, posters, even a ‘Power Panther’ costume. That got the kids’ attention,” Peterson said.

The program, “Eat Smart. Play Hard. San Luis Obispo!” was piloted by Peterson at a Boys’ and Girls’ Club in Oceano and Oak Park Housing Authority in Paso Robles. A key innovation was a buddy system incorporated into the program. Each child participated in the program with a parent or other adult “buddy.”

“We wanted to work with young children, before their diets were substantially influenced by peer pressure and the media,” Peterson said. “It was also important for us to involve an adult who had choices in what kinds of food that came home.”

Each evening’s presentation was divided into three components. The buddies learned about healthy snacking at “knowledge centers,” where handouts in Spanish and English presented simple dietary concepts. For example, one knowledge center helped participants discern healthy food from healthy-sounding food.

“Don’t be fooled!” the handout says. “Fruit bits, fruit rolls or fruits snacks sound like they are fruit, but they are really a form of candy made mainly of sugar, with a small amount of fruit juice concentrate.”

Each week the buddies made and ate healthy snacks, such as watermelon sundaes, fruity pizza and fruit kabobs. In the final component of the weekly program, buddies learned and participated in fun and inexpensive ways to be active indoors or out by using household items, such as milk jugs, bean bags and spatulas. Popular activities were spatula badminton, dance and bean bag toss.

“Ninety percent of the participants indicated they learned ‘lots’ in the class. Their scores on the post-tests rose 20 percentage points compared to their scores on the pre-test,” Peterson said. “We can feel confident that we raised their knowledge about diet and exercise. Putting the knowledge to practice may take some time.”

Funding for the project was provided by the USDA Food Stamp Nutrition Education Program. Program development was done in cooperation with the Center for Weight and Health at UC Berkeley Department of Nutritional Sciences. Peterson received another grant to revise the curriculum based on her pilot testing.  “Eat Smart. Play Hard. San Luis Obispo!” will be presented again in summer 2005.

(January 2005)

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