Healthy Living Starts Early

The American society is more overweight than ever, with childhood obesity reaching record highs in recent years, raising some real concern about what parents are teaching their children about healthy living.When I was in grade school parents either sent their kids to school with bag lunches which were often thrown away, or the kids bought food at the school cafeteria. What I remember most about both of these is that nutritious food wasn't usually in the equation either way. Parents who did send their children to school with a good lunch could usually expect for it to be ignored or thrown away.

It seems that some schools are finally catching on. In an article by Angie Jeffrey of the Greater Danbury News-Times, I was pleased to read that a school in this community in Connecticut is finally providing students with the option to be healthy. Not only have the schools started adjusting their cafeteria menu to include sensible foods like fruit cups, whole grain cereal and muffins, according to the article, but they've also began to reduce portion size as well. This is a move in a very positive direction from traditional school lunches such as pizza and hamburgers with a side of fries.

The change in Danbury was sparked by the implementation of an early morning exercise program four years ago. The program allows students to come to school before class two days a week and walk indoors with their parents and teachers, before having a healthy breakfast. While most of the students in the story participate chiefly for fun, the healthy vibe seems to have worn off; one student told Ms. Jeffrey that she even had fresh fruit at her birthday party.

In a day and age where kids often spend 6-7 hours a day immobile at a desk for 12 years of their lives in school, they can use all of the motivation we can give them to be healthy. If we can teach our children to love exercise and the importance of healthy eating now, they won’t need to join the millions of Americans struggling with diet fads in the future.

According to the American Heart Association, all children over the age of two should get at least 30 minutes of fun physical activity a day. Furthermore, older children should exercise vigorously, ideally in fun activities like group sports, 3-4 times a week for 30 minutes or more. The association adds that "inactive children are likely to become inactive adults," so it is important to teach our children good habits now, before they develop harmful ones. So by reducing the children's sedentary time and replacing it with fun exercise, the schools in Danbury have set an example of the way we should be teaching our children to be healthy adults.

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