Better Learning Through Exercise?

today on tv are present getting kicked off the house of the door and more physically active and some surprising research that shows how exercise doesn't just make kids more fit it makes them better learners i'm kay mcintyre the link between physical activity and academic achievement was the focus of this year's annual obesity conference sponsored by the center for physical activity and weight management at the university of kansas professor joe donnelly is the director of that center joe thanks for coming in today later this hour we'll also visit with dr mark thompson of kansas corrugated schoolhouse and we'll hear from first lady michelle obama who brought her let's move campaign to kansas city this summer but first professor tom lea you're at the forefront of some exciting research that shows getting kids moving while theyre learning actually makes them better learners you develop this idea into a program physical activity across the curriculum tell us about that program it's very difficult to convince the school day increases

productivity but if you do it without taking anything away from academic instruction and he had data to show that the kids actually do better in terms of great achievement glass from behavior stuff like that it's a whole different ballgame last year angle is it increases affected area nor do it is to be traveling through school violence that are proposing more physically education or recess isn't just regional and they simply say no it takes time away from academic thirty years ago the academic instruction or start so we've beamed by doing more than just adding he and recess time heidi in a war yet by physically active lessons we had seventy five to twenty minutes of physical activity a week by doing the same lessons but delivering them by movement so like thomas fell deeper letters on the four people are whether to whether to spell they do activity took from a cafe wrong or selfies west for now geography i

mean you can adapt most lessons to be taught by my movie as opposed to person sitting in the chair and then sutherland was in so the academic achievement as devoted to school imam unfortunately they give lip service to physical activity often stop but don't really care site you sort of after that your strategy tortoise that they care about they care about academic achievement so we snake says collectively into the school choir providing academic to that discomfort is all but there's a huge there's a preponderance of literature that shows that it works white is an adopted more and more schools will close because there's almost no negative literature on physical activity active classrooms compared to pass a question is it something you think most teachers just haven't thought about how to weigh incorporate its collective the

interstates math lesson not trying to cure them of course is a main line attempting to recruit americans what's interesting is dissolved the cost it took almost virtually zero cost is not look this is stuff you conjure up in your mind there's no book it's a concept want to get your head so it has to be photographed the textbook and the mechanism for disseminating messages that remain successful thirty employees which is the teacher prep program so most elementary this is the targeted elementary some of elementary teachers have to take it was one course in physical education recess play time or whatever records here or you could take that course and adapted to train teachers have been physically active was then without any additional spent without any additional

coursework you stranger court without any any expense is always thought that violence is a huge part of what the market with the truth and i've been physically active license so if we continue to get good data coal mine if we were if we can convince people to do it and also probably impacts health and fitness and fat this stuff like that so it it's also a double dip i mean you get a health benefit and you get academic battles are wrapped up in one at essentially no cost you said it's documented that this really works in terms of academic achievement prove to me that words whatever we're sitting here but i mean if we want a lecture and you took the plaza littered were molested made negative literature and put on right you have a politician and a less than probably ever in china right no words to study after study after study that shows thousands of facts when you have to physically active questioner compared to the best of classic

just like anything else it takes a while to catch on to take off the text regardless it takes probably somebody profile doing it little a sudden it becomes the rage i don't know but that's where we have these conferences have to try to illustrate just too white audience that we have a technology that technology but we have a method that it is cost effective that has virtually no downside to it and there's two public school teachers academic achievement just happens to be the method also says fire sword all for increase physical activity there often so forth he dances like tyson really well with a comment the first lady michelle obama gave at that and wc the convention about her let's move initiative that we all need to think outside the box a little bit as far as the school education or

physical activity and incorporated into our daily lives in a way that's not just let's go out and exercise is just let's move yet that's exactly correct in and this program that we're discussing called physical activity across the curriculum does exactly that in fact for the consent for models speaks to that as we do physical activity in the classroom or to do it on a field trip on the way to launch more aware to what happened and what it tells you know well without belaboring the point without actually speaking to the point where it tells the state is it be physically active anytime anyplace anywhere that you don't have to go to a special place like a gymnasium and you have to change your clothes to be physically active it's not part of the west but you do it five days a week across years and it becomes ingrained in you that you can become physically active doing anything what's so it's a remarkably different approach than trying to increase

activity in physical education where it's a set aside time at a special facility again i guess it means that when you get older you were special courts to do these activities it gives you the idea that you know in that environment that you can't be physically active as effectively across the curriculum is exactly the opposite to become physically active anytime anyplace anywhere doing a variety of things that really one would not identify with physical activity perfect you know going out looking at the oak tree and going under george to do so is being physically active to go into science was so didn't change into special clothes even go to the gymnasium you're physically active to go out to a video clip that actually were to stop so i can see how this is work at elementary school kids and sort of fit in with the types of things that they're learning how to somebody at a higher level incorporates some of the same ideas into say teaching shakespeare or or maybe higher level math

elizabeth pointed this gun and lee says that i described as the falloff in junior high kids become self conscious don't want to do goofy stuff they'll like this work from their peers a chartered jet so you're actually correct we need different models across the ages what works in elementary school may not work in middle school may not work and it's common in high school now some of the schools are gone to the concept of a health club traveled bites of weightlifting things that people tend to do as they get older into their twenties thirties forties and so forth papa's got to be pressed the curriculum seems to be very well received and talk about rape violent city after that it's very difficult and other groups of the practices that the same thing when you get into junior high it becomes extremely difficult try to modify the activities but the charisma matters so much psychology so much outside pressure that it done at all right now it appears that you need to

to train their strategy when you get into a seventh eighth ninth grade and then about if you're just tuning in i'm visiting with joe donnelly director of the center for physical activity and weight management at the university of kansas jail hundreds of people heard about physical activity across the curriculum at this year's obesity conference held last week in overland park tells about the conference well the conference and turns the audience the conference is designed for people that can make policy decisions so it's a teacher's school principal superintendent board members foundations top politicians of various levels health department so forth is actually their target audience we have the best of the best in terms of speakers more with a country who specialize and religious saying brain function cognitive function direct measurement of what changes in the brain when people exposed to

physically active academic questions and then we had a bunch of what i would call more practical scientists that translate this into intervention so we have we had some talks that there are little bit more of the basic science end of brain function biological models how the singers and the villages are plausible biological model which is always nice to have a kind of progress is very rapidly to much more practical stuff about how you do this in the classroom on how you had you know people who have been successful at delivering physically active academic wasn't what the results have been and then also an extension into a few other areas such as absenteeism and classroom management because winston's are physically active in the classroom that appears in absenteeism goes down and classroom management is as easy or there isn't much disruption and there's more time on task in other

words when you tell a student you know for was for if they go ahead and do for boys for you know this star trek around with their buddy or do they do for put forth at it seemed like time on task of the corporate world so ago from the basic science and then end up with the practical never last thing is they talk by the kansas court is full of people as to how you would actually make policy changes in schools if you want to increase physical activity in the classroom but those basic science to extremely applied to policies i have one of those corrugated school health people with me today dr mark thompson is the project director of kansas court needed school held at the state department of education mark from a policy standpoint how did you go about encouraging schools to take up the banner increase physical activity since the state of kansas has fairly minimal physical education requirements it is really up to the individual schools to expand upon that they're in essence minimal

requirements for physical education at the elementary school level we're no requirements for physical education at the middle school level and there's one requirement for physical education during the high school years so it is imperative that if schools are wanting to increase the level of physical activity during a school day that they have to go beyond those kind of no more guidelines to to encourage and can program for physical education and some of that can be built into their local politics have schools generally been receptive to the idea that implementing physical activity outside of physical education back in their more academic curriculum some of them have been very receptive to that bird it's a lot it's a learning process for so many schools because they the idea is that for the most part education is they sit at your desk in and pay attention and listen and do your work can and stay under

control i'm in control of the classroom is is essential ford for teachers and and often our physical activity is viewed as as a threat to to the order of a a classroom so there's real economy fine line or juggling the past going to be able to incorporate physical activity into an academic subject but aren't joe pointed out that one of the findings that they came across was that in some ways increasing physical activity during a classroom lesson can actually lead to better behaved students yes they will some of the research is pointing out that if you have a masterful teacher have a teacher who truly understands how to accomplish their lesson plan with physical activity going on it can actually take care of some of the acts that extraneous behavior if they're fidgeting than and disruption that you get it when you when you're trying to have kids be to be stationary torch so how does work in a typical

classroom say i'm a teacher and i have an outlet to teach how would i go about doing well there are any number of ways and then i know do with joe's program they have a variety of lesson plans the teachers can't can implement they can be something as simple as as like a relay race up to the chalk board where they do math problems and ended and neither briskly cocker run run baggage based on those besetting or maybe there's a a number grid on the lay down on the floor and they can hop borer or jump or move from from one to another and in addition subtraction in any number of things like that so one of the things that was talked about at this conference was the research thats been done and a physical activity an academic achievement can you just in a broad brush summarize what we know about the connection between us too

the research tends to look favorably upon error and dave they've had favorable results on a number of factors one of them and ultimately you know you you hope that anything that you do and in schools is going increase academic achievement and there is some research i coming out of new york and texas and in some other other states i'll wear it vaguely are positively linking physical activity with academic achievement they're but they're other benefits then that arm that are also also really can add in and improving academic achievement and that is is decrease behavioral issues in an almost every every instance that i'm aware of wherever they have implemented increase physical activity during the school day behavioral problems have have diminished another another benefit of increased physical activity is

that if it ends up creating a healthier child they're going to have fewer absences and you can actually put a dollar amount on absences so that the if you were fewer days in this day should increase that the learning that occurs and also this is a financial benefit for schools and school districts what would be the connection that you just cannot say will be the connection between is a stint as more physically active and absenteeism if you make the leap between them in a child who's more physically active is going to be a healthier child and potentially ward off illness or or feel feel better about about coming to school on their own studies have shown that the overweight especially obese children are more likely to miss school because socially they they may have a reluctance or more field picked on at school because of because of their weight and so if you if you start taking that out of the equation you have increased the their

attendance as well what about a teacher the good things about all these all these things i have to teach my students and i have passed that i need to prepare them for and this is just sort of one more thing that i need to squeeze into my day had a wide do that what response would you have for a teacher i guess my mind's request would be to just just give a give it a chance given it given a chance given enough at an approach with an open mind a man and see what it's like for her let's say two weeks an end what most teachers for our finding out is that the adolescent pleasant have been built around these physical activity and then the curriculum effort and meet the same goals that that they need to attain but to simply in it in a different way and they actually find many of them find the lessons and a little refreshing the change been refreshing for them and because

they they are able to have less disruption less behavioral issues and they're actually enjoying the teaching experience more one of the things that we have been encouraging through kansas gordon in disco hell is the incorporation of of technology into these types of efforts we have while one of the the unit ways of getting kids out and eminem moving as to use gps locators and you can you can in essence do scavenger hunts in and you can post problems around the course where they have to figure the mounted to be able to move onto to the next stage and you can really make his innocence almost as complicated issue as you want you could make the math problems or science problems are health related to issues that have lessons of iraq wanting to to teach give them a handheld gps unit and have them just start off on the first day and have them

find the first station and then they have to problem solving and move on from there and and they are moving most of most of the time you didn't get a good walk in what you're given a lesson there in your involvement with this project what do you feel like you've gained out of it in terms of your understanding of how kids learn and how we can make blanks parents better for them to think that one of the things i realized his is the differential nature with which we learned that i personally was was was a good sit in your seat and and learned student and i really didn't quite understand why not everybody kid could do it that way and an end thinking back i think to one of my one of my good friends who is a very bright and brave fellow but kind of always always struggled with with canada combined confines of the educational setting then

and movement would've helped him so much in and would have allowed him to to learn differently you know i'm not if i can think of a handful of students that i sat next to in elementary school and i was a pretty good sit in your seat kind of order as well that you know that's a hard thing for a lot of kids to just sit quietly in that kind of it's not behavior that we should really expect that our kids won't we don't necessarily expect them to that any anywhere other than potentially church because for the most part now we'll do it if they're around the house we don't expect them to to just sit quietly in and pay attention the whole time we want them running around we want them to you know go in and outside in and claim if we go to the park we don't want them sitting down and reading reading a book when they have an opportunity to have to run around and enjoy themselves in nothing wrong with reading a book that but you know by nature children want to move and so it's it's challenging to

take a let's say a six year old kid who is full of energy and wanting to move and asking them to sit for six or seven hours a day elsie you'd like us to now about this project and where easygoing in kansas schools are in a really tough spot because financially schools are being ousted to tighten their belts and unfortunately there are certain innocence areas that are are viewed as kind of ancillary where it looking at the arts in hand and physical education and so those are often ones or pinpointed for areas where we can can you know tighten up the school day an anti can tighten our budget where as a child like myself that they grew up in an environment where we've had physical education every day five days a week year around now my

children and your children are not physical education once every every three days and so i'll if if we can if we can get the message out there too decision makers the school administrators and school board members that one of the best ways that they can increase the performance of their of their schools and man i'm talking academic performance and unpacking decrease in absences and an improved behavior is to increase their physical activity of beer in their students whether it's during the school day or or before school walking programs or after school year fitness clubs in that that if they are able to be able to realize the space the feds and maybe we can can kind of reverse this trend of decreasing physical education and increase physical activity and and preached the same goal that there were were trying to trying to

achieve mark thank you so much for coming in today or thinking i'd been visiting with dr mark thompson of kansas court made school health and before that dr joe donnelly of the center for physical activity and weight management at the university of kansas martin joe were both involved in a twelve annual obesity conference sponsored by k u and held in overland park last week one of the program's recognized and commended anti obesity conference was let's move an ambitious campaign launched by first lady michelle obama appeared at ending childhood obesity mrs obama brought her let's move message to kansas city this summer pursuit with a keynote speaker at a national conference at the end of la simply thank you so much kate status as a player and eight i was with the one hundred or as in double a sleepy convention

thank you for being here today and thank you for the outstanding work that you've done in making this a great american institution and also i have to thank you for your prayers for your support i cannot tell you how much that means to me and my girls and my mom and my husband as claire thank you also have so much it really keeps us going and i'm just thrilled to be here one hundred and one years ago the in double a seat he was established in pursuit of a simple goal and that was disbarred this nation to live up to the founding ideals to secure those blessings of liberty to fulfill that promise of equality and since then the work of this organization has been guided by a simple

belief that while we might not fully live out that promise for those blessings for ourselves if we work hard enough and fought long enough and believed strongly enough that we could secure them for our children and for our grandchildren and give them opportunities that we'd never dreamed of for ourselves so and for more than a century the men and women of the nw cb have marched and protested you have lobbied presidents and fought unjust laws you stood up and sat in and risk life and limb so that african americans could take their rightful place as not just at lunch counters and on buses but at universities and on battlefields and in hospitals and

boardrooms in congress the supreme court and yes even the white house the preliminary leading the way so i know that i stand here today and i know that my husband stands where he is today because of this organization because of their struggles and the fact that five friends of all those who came before us but i also know that their legacy and entitlements to be taken for granted and i know it is not simply a gift to be enjoyed instead it has an obligation to be fulfilled and when so many of our children still it's in crumbling schools and a black child is still far more likely to go to prison than white child i think the founders of this organization would agree that our work is not yet done

when african american communities are still harder then just about anywhere by this economic downturn and so many families are just barely squeak and by i think the founders would tell us that now is not the time to rest on our laurels when stubborn inequality still persist in education and health in income and wealth i think those boundaries would urge us to increase our in sin city and to increase our discipline and our focus and keep fighting for better future for our children and our grandchildren and that's why i really wanted to come here today because i wanted to talk with you about an issue that i believe cries out for attention one that is a particular concern to me not just as first lady but as a mother who believes that we oh it to our kids to prepare them for the challenges

that we know lie ahead and that issue is the epidemic of childhood obesity in america today now right now in america one in three children is overweight or obese putting them the greater risk of obesity related conditions like diabetes and cancer heart disease as well we're already spending millions of dollars in this country your victory these conditions and that number is only going to go up when he's on healthy children reach adulthood but it's important to be clear that this issue isn't about how our kids' book is not about that it's about how our kids feel it's about their health and the health of our nation and the health of our economy and there's no doubt that this is a serious problem it's one that is affecting every community across this country but just like with so many other challenges that we face as a nation the african

american community is being hit even harder by this issue we are living today in a time where we're decades beyond slavery we're decades the un jim crow when one of the greatest risk to our children's future is their own health african american children are significantly more likely to be obese or white children nearly half of african american children will develop diabetes at some point in their lives the last half of our children if we don't do something to reverse this trend right now our kids won't be in any shape to continue the work begun by the founders of this great organization of fame won't be in any condition to confront all those challenges that we know still remains so we need to take this issue seriously as

seriously as improving under achieving schools as seriously as eliminating youth violence or stopping the spread of age it at any of the other issues that we know are devastating our communities but in order to address this challenge we also need to be honest with ourselves about how we got here because we know that it wasn't always like this for kids in our communities the way we live today it's very different from even when i was growing up they all agreed many of you probably grew up like i did a community that was a rich fatty the middle class to work people knew their neighbors they looked after each other's kids he's not a strong african american the communities we went to a neighborhood schools

around the corner so many of us had to walk to and from school every day rain or shine i know you've told that story a chicago where i was raised we did it in the no shows and in school we hadn't recessed lights a day in gym class and a lonely atoll in the afternoon after school in the summer there was no way we be allowed to lie around the house watching tv when that many channels our parents made us get out and play outside and again i get out on the inside and we would spend hours ryan my splayed softball freeze tag jump and double dutch

we were constantly on the move only stopping it or wet when streetlights came out right and he was a totally different experience back then in my house we really a that really even when both parents work outside the home most families in my neighborhood sat down at the table together as a family formula and involved marian robinson solace we ate what we restore my mother never cared whether me and my rather light what was on our plates we ate what was there or we didn't eat this simple as that we never ate anything fancy but the portion sizes were reasonable and they were rarely seconds maybe for your father matthew and there was always a vegetable

on the plate and many of our grandparents cnn their own gardens or they relied on and my father told me the vegetable man who brought fresh produce that without people now buy back in they had fresh fruits and vegetables in their own backyards and in jars in their cell or doing the winner and that let him just be a pretty that was helping to build that we know and unless it was sunday oh somebody had word that there were no expectation of dessert after our meals and we'd injury a mask and so what our popular alice for special occasions now if you were lucky you might get a quarter to take to the corner store and it's a penny candy but you did not eat it all at once because you never know when you see an obesity and so you see a bit

it has been the indiana game without any expert advice and without spending too much money we managed to lead a pretty healthy lives but things are a whole different today and many kids these days are so fortunate enough so many kids janet's a neighborhood schools are down so instead of walking to school their right in a car or in a bus and in too many schools recess in gym class have been slashed because of budget cuts here is about safety mean that those afternoons outside have been replaced by afternoons inside the tv video games the internet in fact studies have found that african american

children spend an average of nearly six hours a day watching tv and that every extra hour of tv they watches associated with consumption of an additional additional one hundred and sixty seven calories for many folks though is nutritious family meals are a thing of the past that a lot of people today are living in communities without a single grocery store so they have to take a two three buses the taxi was a mile just to my head a lettuce force that it gives of fresh fruit for their kids most folks don't grow their own food the way many of our parents and grandparents did a lot of folks also just don't have the time to cook at home on a regular basis so instead they wind up grabbing fast food or something from the corner store and many more places that have few if any healthy

options and we've seen how kids in our communities rarely stopped by the store is on their way to school behind themselves so is it pop and ships for breakfast and we see that those same stories that i still live there afternoon snack of candy and sugary drinks according to one study on average a trip to the corner store a child to walk out of that store with more than three hundred and fifty calories worth of food and beverage this is on average so they're going to win three times a day that you're really going to get all of these things made for perfect storm of bad habits and unhealthy choices of lifestyle that's doing too many of our children too a lifetime of poor health and undermining our best efforts to build them a better future well i

think the best schools on earth but if they don't have the basic nutrition they need to concentrate they're still going to have the challenge to learning and we can create the best jobs in the world we must but that won't mean that also had the energy and the stamina to actually do those jobs we can offer people the best health care money can buy but if they're still eating unhealthy lives then will still just be treating those diseases and conditions once they've developed rather than keeping people from getting sick in the first let's see if anything it's that none of us wants that kind of future for our kids or for country and surely the men and women of the end of a lace ep haven't spent a century organizing in advocating and working day and night only to raise the first

generation in history that might be on track to live shorter lives than their parents that's why i've made improving the quality of our children's health one of my top priorities as many of you may know my efforts began with the planning of a garden on the south lawn of the white house but it's important to understand that this garden symbolizes so much more than just watching beautiful things grow it's become a way to spark a broader conversation about the health and well being not just of art she had spun of our communities and in an effort to elevate that conversation nationally we launched let's move its a nationwide campaign to rally this country were in a single ambitious goal and that is to solve childhood obesity in a generation so that children born today reach adulthood at a healthy weight and for this initiative we're

bringing together governors and mayors businesses and community groups educators parents athletes health professional you name it because it has gone to take all of us working together to help our kids lead healthier lives right from the beginning let's move the campaign has four components the first were working to give parents the information they need to make healthy decisions for their families for example we're working with the fda and the food industry to provide better label and something simple so folks don't act it's been our swimming at labels try to figure out whether the food they're buying is healthy or not our new health here legislation requires chain restaurants to post the calories in the food they serve so that parents have the information they need to make healthy choices for their kids' address and we're working with doctors and pediatricians to ensure that they routinely screened our children for obesity and i can personally attest to the value of these

screenings based on my own personal experiences because it won that long ago when the obamas we're exactly eating as healthy as we should have been and it was our daughter's pediatrician who actually pulled aside and suggested that i think about making some changes to our family's diet and i know it made a world of difference but we also know that getting better information to parents is not enough because with thirty one million american children participating and federal school meal programs many of our kids are consuming as many lives happier daily calories at school that's why the second part let's move to get healthier food into ours and they're working to re authorize our child nutrition legislation that makes significant new investments to revamp our school meals and improved the food that we offer you know school vending machine so that we're serving our kids less sugar salt and

fat and more vegetables fruits and whole grains this is bipartisan legislation and it is critically important for the health and success of our children and we're hoping that congress will act swiftly to get this passed it flies we also know that healthy eating is only half the battle experts recommend at least sixty minutes a day of activity that's at least the bare minimum and many of our kids aren't even close so the third part let's move is to help our kids get moving to find new ways for them to get and stay active and fit and we're working to get more kids participating in daily physical education classes and to get more schools offering recess for their students we set a goal of increasing the number of kids to walk or ride their bikes to school by fifty percent in the next five years and we recruited

professional athletes they've been fantastic for different sports leagues to inspire kids to get up walk that couch and get moving but we know that even if we offered the most nutritious school meals and we give kids every opportunity to be fit and we give parents the information they need to prepare healthy food for their families all that won't mean much if our family still live in communities where that healthy food simply isn't available in the first place and that brings me to a fourth and final component of the campaign and that is to ensure that all families have access to fresh affordable food in their communities where they live and one of the most shocking statistics for me and all of this is that right now twenty three point five million americans including six point five million children live in what we call food deserts areas without a single supermarket

this is particularly serious an african american communities where folks wind up buying their groceries at places like gas stations in bodegas and course towards what we often pay higher prices for lower quality food but the good news is that we know that this trend is reversible weapon because when healthier options are available in our community we know that folks will actually take advantage of those options one study found that african americans at thirty two percent more fruits and vegetables for each additional supermarket in their community so we know the difference that we can make with some changes we know that when we provide the right incentives things like grants and tax credits and help securing permits and zoning businesses are willing to invest and lay down roots in our communities and many grocers are finding that when they set up shop

in tiny areas they can actually make a decent profit they are learning that they can do well by doing good so as part of let's move we proposed a healthy food financing initiative a four hundred million dollar a year fund that will use to attract hundreds of millions of more dollars from the private nonprofit sectors to bring grocery stores and other healthy food retailers to underserved areas across the country and our goal is ambitious we want to eliminate food deserts in this country within seven years and create jobs and revitalize neighborhoods along the way so i know these goals are ambitious and they are many many more and as first lady i am going to do everything that i can to ensure that we meet them but i also know that at the end of the day government can

only do so much i had spoken to so many experts about this issue and not a single one of them said that the solution is to have government tell people what to do it's not our work instead this is about families taking responsibility and making manageable changes that fit with their budgets and their needs and their taste that's the only way it's gonna work it's about making those little changes that you really had out simple things like taking the stairs instead of the elevator walking instead of ran and a car but even something as simple as turning on the radio and dancing with your children than a million living room for hours about replacing all over they're soda and those sugary drinks with water are fascinated with alien worlds alike or deciding that they don't get dessert with every meal and i felt like he

deserted now right now where they don't get it every day or just being more thoughtful about how we can hear baking instead of flying i know it's going to be a cutting back on those abortion signs look no one wants to give up sunday neil know is this a divided and she even fried chicken and mashed potatoes are going hungry no one wants to do that not even the obama strategy but chefs across the country are showing us that with a few simple changes and substitutions we can find healthy creative solutions that work for our families and our communities and that's why i am excited about our new less carbon video series which we're launching let's

move website and let's move back this is a great series featuring sam kass a lot of things to that helps with the series features some of the country's top chefs will be demonstrating how folks can prepare simple affordable nutritious meals for their families the first guess is that guy by the name of marvin lewis who's known for his cuisine based in north africa or the caribbean south america the lowcountry he's demonstrating how to prepare a week a healthy and tasty dinners for a family of four on a tight budget and it provides a recipe shopping list so that folks can do it all themselves at home and finally it's one thing we can think about is working to make sure that our kids get a healthy start from the beginning by promoting breastfeeding in our communities we do know

is that babies that progress there are less likely to be oh east as children but forty percent of african american babies are never breast fed at all not even during the first weeks of their lives and we know that this isn't possible or practical for some others but we got a wic program that's providing new support to low incomes moms who like to try to do because the support they need and under the new health care legislation businesses will now have to accommodate mothers who want to continue breast feeding once they get back to work for another name you may not understand how important it is the trust me it's important to have a place to go but let's be clear this is it just about changing what our kids are eating and the lifestyles their leading it's also about changing our own habits as well and believe it or not if you are obese

there's a forty percent chance that your kids will be obese as well and if both you and the child of a parent or obese that number jumps to eighty percent and this is more than just genetics and work in the fact is we all know we are childrens first and best teachers and role models weeds he's very unhealthy habits not yours by what we say about how we live shoot i can't sell millions laugh at their vegetables upon security at a french fries trust me they will not let that happen i can tell them to go run around outside of huntsville and online free time on the couch watching tv and this isn't just about the example that we set as individuals as families but about the lifestyle we're promoting in our communities as well it's about the example we said in our schools it's about schools like the kelley edwards elementary school in western south carolina it's an award winner in our usda healthy us

cool challenge this is a school where students have plant their own gardens or that they can taste all kinds of fresh vegetables and they stay active because they got their own dance team and it's also about establishing strong community partnerships animal drugs for every sector and every background there's a fresh food financing initiative in pennsylvania it's a great example this initiative is a collaboration between business nonprofit in government that's funded more than eighty supermarket projects bringing nutritious food so hundreds of thousands of people and other certain unions these are just a couple of the thousands of programs and projects that are making a difference in communities across the country already so there's any guide here at all this talk of who feels a little overwhelmed by this challenge because it can be overwhelming it clear if anyone here who might even already

losing hope think about how hard it will be to get going for giving up i just want you to take a little round all the things that are already being accomplished because i want folks to learn from each other and be inspired by each other because that's what we've always done that is exactly what happened here in the city half a century the signals back in nineteen fifty eight right here in kansas city salt what folks down in montgomery and achieve with their bus boycott so they were inspired by all those men and women who walk miles well miles home each day on aching feet because they knew there was a principle at stake so folks hearing organized their old boy cap of department stores that refuse to serve african americans and bill's publicizing their meeting statement and this is a point they

stop riding in montgomery celeste out mining kansas city a local music teacher even compose a song that became the anthem for their efforts it was entitled let's take a walk that counts and then as you know a few years later in april of nineteen sixty four folks turned out in droves to pass a public accommodations law mandating that all residents regardless of your skin color be served in restaurants hotels and other public places even folks who were too sick to walk show that's about one organizer recall that they used wheelchairs to get people to the polls and even brought one man in on a stretcher see something about that being carried to the ballot box on a stretcher

those votes didn't do all that just for themselves they did it because they wanted something better for their children and for their grandchildren that's why they did it and in the end that's what has driven this organization since its founding in his wife daisy bates into or hate mail in dutch threats to guide those nine young men and women who would walk through those schoolhouse doors in the world it is like thurgood marshall fought so hard to ensure that children like linda brown and children like my daughters and your sons and daughters would never again know before inequality of separate but equal is why so many men and women legends and icons in ordinary folks have faced down their doubts their cynicism and their fears and they've

taken that walk that counts so we owe it to all those who come before us to ensure that all those who come after us our children our grandchildren that they have the strength and the energy and the enduring that help that they need to continue to complete their journey so i'm asking you in the lapd while you were with me let's do it and i'm not an endeavor that i mean we cannot change the health of our community of the enemy each and every single one of you don't want to get there for this campaign fights future we do this together we can say is the way i think about their health will ever so i thank you all in advance again for your prayers your thoughts in your support the struggle continues thank you wall that lesson that was first lady michelle obama giving the keynote

address at this year's national convention of the and the police and he held in kansas city july twelfth two thousand find out more about mrs obama's let's move campaign against childhood obesity at their website but you did you did you got let's move back that's daddy daddy daddy you got let's move that cioffi president obama has declared september the first ever childhood obesity awareness month you can hear an archive k pr presents about childhood obesity at our website k pr back at you that edu if you have any questions or comments about today's k pr preserves or have a suggestion for a future program i'd love to hear from you my email address is kate mcintyre at play you that edu that hey embassy i n t y r e k u edu thanks for joining me this week we are present is a production of kansas public radio at

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