National Childhood Obesity Month  |  Childhood Obesity Resources

It’s National Childhood Obesity Month, this is the first year we as a nation have a month devoted to raising awareness and sharing strategies to fight childhood obesity.

The Presidential Proclamation states, “One of the greatest responsibilities we have as a Nation is to safeguard the health and well-being of our children.  We now face a national childhood obesity crisis, with nearly one in every three of America’s children being overweight or obese.  There are concrete steps we can take right away as concerned parents, caregivers, educators, loved ones, and a Nation to ensure that our children are able to live full and active lives.  During National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month, I urge all Americans to take action to meet our national goal of solving the problem of childhood obesity within a generation.” Read more >First National Childhood Obesity Month

We are excited to announce a brand new area of the website launched this month, devoted to helping parents of overweight and obese children. Created especially for families who are challenged by childhood obesity the new area is packed with nutrition information, wellness tools, strategies and tips for promoting healthy diets and being active.

Childhood obesity effects many families and we are here to support them.  Teachers, organization and communities utilize our nutrition handouts, family wellness articles, nutrition lesson plans, worksheets, and our USDA Food Pyramid based nutrition education tools and games. We have over 25 online games and tools available in English or Spanish.

Nourish Interactive’s website provides free online nutrition education tools, healthy eating articles and resources for parents, teachers, health care professional and communities. The entire site is designed to make learning fun and to promote taking small steps to improve nutrition for children. We have matching information, tips and tools designed for both parents and children, so the whole family can work as team to eat healthier and be physically active.

The website is free so that all children and families have access to learn and play. Sign up for free membership to get access to our featured game, “Chef Solus and the Food Pyramid Adventure Game” a 7 level interactive flash game that teaches kids about the Food Pyramid, eating healthy and balancing food and energy needs. Learn more about our nutrition games for children Nourish Interactive – The Fun Way to Learn About Nutrition!

We believe that prevention through early nutrition education is the best treatment. Understanding nutrition at a young age will give children the knowledge and skills they need to make healthy choices throughout their lives.  We have grown to over 40,000 parent members and 4,00o organization that use our nutrition education tools.

Many cities, organizations, schools and websites that link to and share our free nutrition education learning platform with their members and visitors. Showcase of sites that promote our website. National Childhood Obesity Month is a great time to spread the word and let your family, friends, community and your child’s school know about our free bilingual website!

You can help spread the word, by sharing a link on your website, blog or social network or print a website flyer or family nutriton tip sheet

Nourish Interactive’s New Related Resources for Parents:

NEW Childhood Obesity area for parents

Quick links to our online tools and printables

Helpful articles about parenting overweight child

Helpful Childhood Obesity Organization, Resources and Articles:

Let’s Move The First Lady’s Campaign to end childhood obesity within a generation.

Robert Woods Johnson Foundation – Childhood Obesity Resources, Studies and Public Health Policy

The National Council on Childhood Obesity Awareness Month encourages individuals and organizations to do whatever they can to build understanding of the causes and implications of childhood obesity and to earnestly seek solutions to stem the epidemic. While the focus now is on September as National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month, the effort must be sustained and widespread, according to organizers. Read more > Childhood Obesity Month

Too Little Sleep Increases Childhood Obesity Time Magazine

Parents Turn to Personal Trainers to Fight Childhood Obesity CBS News

Childhood Obesity Rates and Facts Sheets by State CDC

Study finds Childhood Obesity Varies by Neighborhood

Childhood Obesity Rates may be Underreported

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Calling all cooks! Interested in submitting a healthy recipe for the new White House recipe contest? Your recipe may be chosen to be included in the Popular Choice Vote or judge by a panel of judge to win these prizes

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced the Recipes for Healthy Kids Challenge to improve school meals and the health of children across the nation through the creation of exciting new recipes for inclusion on school lunch menus. The competition is part of the First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! initiative.

“The Recipes for Healthy Kids Challenge is an important contribution to our overall efforts to combat childhood obesity,” the First Lady said. “It’s vital that we provide our children with healthy and nutritious food in school and help them learn healthy eating habits that will last a lifetime.”

Recipes for Healthy Kids Challenge Website

Recipes for Healthy Kids Press Release

Family night at Fresh Choice was a huge success.   Kids really enjoyed learning about fresh fruits and vegetables while playing games.  Parents watched their kids learn about healthy food choices and picked up some eating out tips.

Fresh Choice wanted to do something positive in honor of National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month.  The best way to fight childhood obesity is through early nutrition education so that kids learn at a young age about healthy eating.  This is just such a great example of making nutrition education fun and interactive!

The night was so well received that Fresh Choice is planning to do more of these Family Nights at more of their restaurants.

I usually review books that focus on healthy eating for children but I just came across a special book that focuses on healthy foods for babies and toddlers.

The book is called “Organically Raised – Conscious Cooking for Babies and Toddlers”  by Anni Daulter and Shanté Laney.

This book does a great job of walking you through the steps of introducing solid food and when and how to expand food choices.  We often don’t talk about the effects of processed foods on babies but this book answers lots of those questions with supporting research.  It is very simple to read and well written.

The book is sprinkled with little sayings and affirmations called “Mama Mantra” and I love that because it isn’t always easy!  Babies have a little mind of their own – not to mention toddlers and food can be a challenge.  ”Mama Tips” are also found throughout the book along with some special topics like “food allergies”.

It is very visually appealing with lots of  pictures of babies, toddlers and healthy foods throughout the book.  I like books that make me want to look more.   I found myself smiling a lot as I looked at full page shots of kids learning about foods.  Brought back lots of memories of when my children were being introduced to solid foods. (oh they grow so fast!)

The book is filled with recipes too!  If you have a baby or toddler, this is a must have book.

Read more about this book.

Everyone is busy getting their kids back to school.  What a perfect time to take a little break and bring the kids to a Family Night that will mix fruits and vegetables and lots of FUN.  Nourish Interactive has been working with Fresh Choice to reach out to kids and promote healthy eating.  With September being National Childhood Obesity Awareness month, it is a reminder to us how important healthy foods and daily activity is for kids.

We are happy to let our San Mateo, CA and nearby Peninsula cities know that the Fresh Choice Restaurant in San Mateo will host its First Family Night.  Nourish Interactive will be there with nutrition education games to make fruits and vegetables fun for kids.

Click to go to Facebook Event Page!

Take a night off from cooking and enjoy fresh seasonal fruits and vegetables from their local farm while the kids have some fun learning about healthy food choices.

Just a few of the FREE & FUN nutrition activities for kids:

• Take a picture with Chef Solus
• Play Nourish Interactive Games- winner of Parents’ Choice Seal and Children’s Library Association Award
• Play tic-tac-toe   The vegetables versus Chef Solus
• Coloring fruits and vegetables while kids learn where produce really comes from!
• Spin the wheel, land on a fruit or vegetable and win a prize!
• Healthy eating out tips for parents to take home.
• Each child will have their name entered into a contest and have a chance to win a Wii game system.

Play the Yummy Drops Fruit Game and automatically get a FREE Kids meal coupon for Fresh Choice Restaurant!

More information:

Family Night event at Fresh Choice Restaurant in San Mateo, CA

Fresh Choice and Nourish Interactive Partnership

Nourish Interactive partnered with Fresh Choice!

Sleep: the ultimate school supply

Start the school year off right by getting your kids back on a healthy sleep schedule! Have them go to bed at the same time each night and get a consistent amount of sleep.

Mondays are a great day to renew Family Health vows. Every Monday, you will find some healthy tip to help your family start the week off on a Healthy Note!

Thanks to Healthy Monday organization for sharing their Monday tips.

Related resources:

Getting into sleep routine for back to school- video by St Christopher’s Hospital

Back to school sleeping requirements and tips – from The Sleep Doctor

I want to thank all the wonderful people who supported us in the Michelle Obama “Apps for Healthy Kids” contest.

We won’t know until September (no specific date given) who were the winners of the contest.  But we were in the top five for popular vote and that says a great deal about the support we received from everyone.

But I wanted to give a special shout out to the Mommy Bloggers who really stepped up to support us!  Putting our banner on their page and sharing our website and contest with all their readers.

Please help us support them by visiting their sites.  To make it easy for you to find these great websites, we have created a  special page that lists their websites and the wonderful services they provide for other moms.

We are all mothers and it is great we can help support each other and the wonderful work that every one is doing.

Check out these mom-owned and run websites and blogs.  They have great healthy tips, recipes, products and services to help families.

List of Exclusive Mommy Bloggers Websites

Thanks to all who participated in our Children’s Nutrition Survey and Curious Chef Kids’ Cooking Set Giveaway, over 500 responded to share their feedback on our nutrition education website, children’s nutrition, current food issues and challenges for getting kids to eat healthier.

We heard from many parents, grandparents, educators and health care and food service professionals, neighbors, and more. Thank you for sharing the survey with friends and on Twitter and for taking the time to share your experiences and great opinions. We  value all of your thoughts and ideas and will be releasing a report on this exciting nutrition study very soon!

The wonderful prize of child sized cooking tools by Curious Chef drew great interest for the survey. ‘Cooking with kids‘ is a hot topic, as more families are finding getting children involved in the kitchen increases children’s interest in eating healthy foods and more communities are offering cooking classes for kids of all ages.  We used random.org to choose the winner and send congratulations to Brett M from Tampa Florida the winner of the Curious Chef 27 piece Foundation Set!

Visit Curious Chef for fun child sized cooking tools for kids in the kitchen! Start your collection of kid sized cooking tools with one special piece, a foundation set to get started or a gift set. For added value look for money saving online coupons and free shipping offers on their site.

You can also follow them on Twitter at http://twitter.com/curiouschef

Just in time for back to school a new video created by Farm to School Movement”Lunch Encounters of the Third Kind”

Learn more about the Farm to School Movement and Child Nutrition Act Reauthorization at www.onetray.org

Related resources and action guides:

Sign a online petition to support the movement via onetray.org

Community Action Guide to Change School Food Policy- PDF

School Food Article by Nourish Healthy Kids

Prime time, not snack time

Avoid having the family munching in front of the television this week. It’s harder to keep track of how much you’re eating!

Mondays are a great day to renew Family Health vows. Every Monday, you will find some healthy tip to help your family start the week off on a Healthy Note!

Thanks to Healthy Monday organization for sharing their Monday tips.