- Author: Emily Harris
On December 3rd I spoke to Professor Cerda's Child Nutrition class at Fresno City College. She asked me to answer the question, “How is UC CalFresh fighting childhood obesity?” What a loaded question! In order to answer this question, I decided to give her class an overview of both our adult and youth programs, with an emphasis on our direct nutrition education with students in the classroom. I didn't forget to mention, however, our nutrition class series we hold for adults in the community and parents of our students. Children eat what their parents give them, so half the battle really is educating parents on how best to feed their children. In the classroom, we provide lessons for the students that go over MyPlate and then highlight a certain food group or physical activity. The students in the Child Nutrition class experienced our “Rethink Your Drink” lesson first hand, which furthered their understanding of what we do. Hot topics during my presentation included teachers' role and influence in their students' health education and students' responses to our “Tasting Time” foods we provide every other month. At the end of my presentation, I asked this class two questions: “What does it mean to be healthy? How do we fight childhood obesity? “I asked some of my older elementary students this year what it means to be healthy, so I was curious what college students would have to say. I also wanted to know if they believed that what we are doing is a way to fight childhood obesity, or if there is a key idea or concept that they believe we are missing. Check out their responses below:
Now it's your turn! Leave yours answers to these two questions in a comment below.