New Tools Tackle Childhood Obesity
What Will Get Kids Healthy?
POSTED: 3:38 pm EST February 3, 2010
UPDATED: 5:43 pm EST February 3, 2010
BOSTON -- Schools in Massachusetts have begun screening kids for obesity. The nurse's office will be sending home BMI report cards.It's part of a state mandate to get kids healthier. But as NewsCenter 5's Heather Unruh reported, one town is using a unique program to get kids active.Todd Ducharme, of Milton, Mass., knows how to have fun on the playground and get kids revved up. But he's not a gym teacher."Take the bean bag and toss it to someone across from you," he told the second-grade students at Glover Elementary School in Milton.Katz runs a new exercise program at Milton's elementary schools. It's called CATZ play designed to help students get the most out of their recess."The majority of schools in Massachusetts have PE once a week. And there are a lot of schools that don't have PE at all, and the budgets have been cut," Ducharme said."It brings in every kind of child not just the athletic kids," Dore Korschun, the principal of Glover Elementary School.The program is especially important as the rate of childhood obesity cases soars. Thirty percent of kids age 10 to 17 in Massachusetts are overweight. The state is addressing the problem with a new tool this year. For the first time, all schools are required to calculate the body mass index of students in grades 1, 4, 7 and 10."It's making them aware that (you know) taking care of themselves is something important," said Korschun.Some argue the report cards will only humiliate kids. But some nurses said a BMI report card has the potential the make a difference if parents take the information seriously."If the parents are on board as well, it will make kids realize that they do have to focus on eating healthy as well as doing exercise," said Maureen LeBlanc, a nurse at Glover Elementary School.
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