How to Solve Childhood Obesity - Whatever Wednesday

First of all...the title of this post seems to say that I know the answer of solving the epidemic of childhood obesity. I don't. Let's just get that out of the way, alright? Alright. So, let's get on with this shall we?

My husband likes to listen to talk radio from Chicago's WGN station. I can take it or leave it. The other night however, the radio was on and the show's host began talking about childhood obesity and how this generation of children may actually have a shorter lifespan than their parents. He also discussed children's lack of daily exercise and bad eating habits. So far I was on board with this guy! That's right! Let's talk about the nitty gritty and figure out how to fix it!

"In most Chicago schools," he said, "kids don't have gym class daily. Kids need to move more! When I was a kid we had gym everyday!!" He contined, "And the food and snacks these kids eat and have access to in schools. Pop and candy machines all over the place."

"I have a solution to these problems!" he exclaimed. Great! I'm leaning closer to the radio at this point eager to hear some intelligent conversation and solutions. His solution? "Teachers should spend less time on English, math and history and devote more time to exercise. As for the vending machines in schools? Raise the prices and the kids won't eat them."

WHAT!!! Was he kidding? I couldn't believe what he had said. I was so mad at this point I raced to the phone to call in and give him a piece of my mind! Thank goodness, the lines were busy and I couldn't get through. I had a hundred arguments running through my head about why he was wrong and I would have sounded like a ranting maniac if I had gotten through.

Now that I am a bit more calm though I do have a couple arguments against his solutions. First, teachers are being asked every year to teach more content with less resources in public schools. Why should they be expected to be responsible for the health of children which, as I view it, is parents' responsibilities . If kids need to move more it should be parents' jobs to get it done. Turn off the tv and go outside with your kids and play and exercise together. I doubt there is any adult in this country, myself included, who would be harmed by a little more exercise. Teachers have enough to do folks let's not burden them anymore with getting our kids healthy. That's our job.
The kids and I often go for walks and runs together. The boys have come to see me run races. This fall we are planning on running a fun run together! Sometimes when the weather is bad we load up in the car for McDonald's Playland and eat apples and drink milk. Sometimes when the weather is bad I bundle the munchkins up and force them outside! And guess what...they usually play outside for a long time even if it is cold. A little bad weather never killed a kid, no matter how much they tried to convince you otherwise.

However what is the school's responsibility are the foods they make available to our children be it from the vending machines or the cafeteria. I remember the vending machines at the school where I taught. They were full of pop and candy, nothing healthy. After school or basketball practice kids get hungry and they will eat whatever is available, healthy or not. Instead of raising prices, which I don't think will change kids' eating habits, get rid of the pop and candy machines and offer something else. My old high school has a vending machine for milk that is very popular. Why not fill vending machines with dried fruit, nuts and healthy granola bars? One reason schools don't change vending machines is because of the revenue they produce. For many athletic departments a large portion of their income comes from vending machines. Of course they don't want to change something that works. Parents, if you want it changed you are probably going to be the ones to do the work. The milk machine I mentioned before wasn't provided by the school. Instead it was put in by the Agriculture Dept. and stocked by parents. And no, the athletic department in that school didn't like it. Funny..you'd think the athletic department would be for healthy eating!

I ate 12 years of cafeteria food and I hated it! So much in fact, that during the 5 years I taught in a public school I NEVER ate a school lunch...even when I forgot my lunch at home. Fried food, salt, tasteless...ugh, I just couldn't do it. I recently found this blog, Fed Up With Lunch; The School Lunch Project. A public school teacher in Illinois is eating school lunch everyday for a year and blogging about it. It's been very enlightening so far as what is being offered to our children as a "healthy" lunch.

My boys will be starting full day kindergarten this fall and I'm planning on packing their lunches. I don't know what their school's lunch program is like. It may be great, I don't know. What I do know is that if we start packing lunches now it will, hopefully, turn into a healthy habit for years to come. It will also provide my boys some independence to make their own food choices. The apple or the banana. The milk or the juice. How many times in their lives do kids face situations when they don't have a choice? Even as adults we like choices rather than being told what we have to do.

Childhood obesity is a big problem in this country. We all know that. I say start at home and don't expect the government of public institutions to fix it for us. I'm all for Michelle Obama and her national initiative but she isn't the ones fixing my kids' dinners or grocery shopping for my family. I am. I don't have all the answers folks; I just had a response to a radio guy that bugged me. What about you? Do you have some answers? What do you do in your household to keep your family healthy? What do you need to do better in the future?

In case you are interested here is a BMI Caluculator for kids.

Whatever Wednesday - The Death of My Shoes

As all married couples have probably figured out, husbands and wives get on each others nerves. I guess that's what happens when all the little embarrassing things you hide while you are dating come out after the wedding. My husband leaves his socks on the floor and falls asleep to the radio...it bugs me. I have a million craft projects strewn around the house and he doesn't like how I organize the kitchen...that bugs him. But what really gnaws at him, what really gets his goat are my shoes.
To defend myself, I don't where these in public. I know they are ugly. That's the point! I wear these to the basement to do laundry, to get the mail, or to work in the garden. They are easy to get on and off especially when I'm carrying a baby or a basket of laundry. I live out in the country folks, I NEED grubby shoes.

Their are nicely broken in and comfy.
I have an intimate relationship with these shoes! After all I've had them for, oh let's do the math....oh my. I have had these shoes an embarrassing amount of time. Let's just say these shoes are older than my children...combined. You do the math.

Hubby has been nagging me, constantly and persistently, to get rid of these shoes.

"But what will I wear to the garden?" I whined.

"Go get a pair of those Croc shoes. They'll wash off easy." he replied.

I cringed. Crocs...uugghh....I thought Crocs were ugly. I have never figured out what the attraction was to those shoes. But my shoes are ugly too so what the heck. I went shoe shopping and found these. Not Crocs but close.
And oh, was I ever wrong. Now I know why people wear these all over the place. They are SO SO comfy! I have been wearing these constantly for a week! They are like little pillows for my feet.

I still think they are ugly but, hey, I won't be wearing them in public. Well, maybe just once. They are really, really comfy!

Now hubby is happy and he burned my shoes yesterday. I snuck out of bed last night, gathered the ashes and ceremoniously scattered them in the dark. They served me well those wonderful shoes. Silently, in my Croc knockoffs, I tiptoed back in the house. Hubby was right and I was wrong. I did need a new pair of shoes...just don't tell him I told you so.

Shooting Old Yeller

When my twins were about three years old their favorite movie was Old Yeller. The Disney movie set in Texas in the late 1800's about Travis and his dog, Old Yeller. At the time I was telling another mother, with amusement, how often they asked to watch it.

"Do you let them watch...the end?" she asked.

Of course, she was referring to when Travis the main character, has to shoot his dog Old Yeller who has contracted "hydraphoby" (rabies).

At first I thought she was joking! It had never dawned on me to hide that scene from them. It wasn't a bloody or gory moment and Travis was forced to do something he didn't want to do. I viewed it as a teachable moment to discuss death, grief and sadness.

Over the years the boys and I have watched a lot of wildlife documentaries to learn about our world and its animals. Most of the time I was disappointed because directors chose not to show any death in the animal kingdom. The giraffe barely escapes the lion or the reindeer gets away from the wolf. How will my children learn about the "circle of life" if its always edited out?

Life isn't like it used to be when America was an agrarian society. A time where children saw birth and death first hand out in the barn. They saw it, understood it and accepted it as a part of life. Growing up, my sisters and I spent part of every summer butchering chickens with Mom and Grandma. Grandma chopped off their heads, with a very dull axe, and our job was to catch the chicken after they were done flopping around. Yes, it was bloody. Yes, there were parts of it I didn't enjoy. But I liked to eat chicken...so I did the job and went on.

The only first hand experience my boys have had with death was when Knothead the dog killed a squirrel in front of them. My dad still laughs hysterically over that story but that is another post for another time.

Last week I found Disney's EARTH documentary and I applaud it. Not only do they have Darth Vader (aka James Earl Jones) narrating but they aren't afraid to show the realities of death. The wolf catches the baby caribou. The lion pride takes down the elephant. The male polar bear starves because he can't hunt.

EARTH'S death scenes are never bloody or gruesome. In fact when the Great White Shark attacks it is almost a beautiful moment. The scene shows the shark leaping from the water while attacking its prey in slow motion and set to classical music. Of course, there were times while watching the film when the boys were uncomfortable. But they didn't want to turn it off and I answered all the questions they had. Death is a way of life and I wouldn't be doing my job as a parent if I wasn't educating my children about life and death.

So I am wondering, how have you had to handle this subject with your own children? What works? What doesn't? How did you come to terms with death growing up?

MY GED Class - Whatever Wednesday

Something you don't know about me is that I teach a GED course part-time. Not exactly a position this former art teacher was looking for but something I sort of fell into. Our family had just moved to the area about 2 1/2 years ago. My boys had just turned 3 and I felt an itch to get back to teaching art. So I rounded up every school address in the area and sent out resumes. For good measure I even sent a resume to the local community college thinking maybe they would need a part time art instructor to teach a class or two. Luckily they got back with me about a position....teaching a GED class. What?

Well I agreed to meet for an interview and as the gentleman who was interviewing me was going over class materials and requirements it dawned on me that I wasn't being interviewed. He was merely explaining to me what would be expected of me to teach the class. I don't think he ever asked me one "interview" question.

Finally I felt the need to speak out, "I am an art teacher. You know that, right? I've never taught math or English."

His reply? "You made it through college didn't you?" Of course I had, and of course he knew that too.

So there I was. College educated and willing and breathing. And as far as I could gather those were the only requirements to teach a GED class. So I am a GED instructor and have been for about two years. Six months a year, two nights a week, two and half hours a night. Some days I absolutely hate it and other times it becomes a joy to teach someone who truly wants to learn. But boy have I learned a thing or two. Not just about math and English but about our culture and society and the mess it seems to be getting itself into.

Now I had a completely different draft for this section of the post and it was blooming into a big long rant on the failure of our society and the lack of ambition and work ethic among Americans....but I deleted it. I don't want to go there.

However, I do want to encourage any of you who are the parents or grandparents of a high school student or just know a high school student who may be contemplating dropping out of school to do all you can to get them through high school. I have a masters and bachelors degree in Art and I have always loved school. Embarrassingly, I admit, I never gave much thought to those who have dropped out of school until I started teaching this class.

I never realized just how difficult it was to get any job without a diploma. The thought of a high school dropout, a 18 year old kid came to mind. I had never thought about those who had dropped out twenty years ago and what they were doing now. In the words of one of my 50 year old students, "Kids who drop out of school have a rude awakening for them. You can't get a job anywhere without a diploma. It wasn't like that when I was a kid. It will get to a point when you have to have a college degree to get a job!"

Times they are a changing. Unfortunately it seems in education that these changing times are putting more responsibility on our children. Instead of half day kindergarten now it is full day. Teachers are expected to teach more content in less amount of time than ever before. Students are expected to start kindergarten already knowing their numbers, ABC's and colors. I didn't know ANYTHING when I started kindergarten!! No wonder our kids are stressed out by school and there is a "dropout crisis".

I don't think I have to stress the importance of education. But, I have never met one kid thinking of quitting school who had second thoughts at the time and I have never met one person who had quit school who didn't regret it. There are a vast number of reasons people have dropped out of school. Home life problems, bullies, loss of interest.

If you know of anyone thinking of quitting school, please, push, pull, drag them kicking and screaming to get that diploma. They will thank you later. As I have found in my GED class, sometimes those kids just need someone they can turn to for help. Someone to get on them to turn in homework. Someone who really cares about them and their future. Maybe it is your child or your child's friend or your neighbor. You can be the one to get them through.

Some of my readers have young children and you may think, "Why should I worry about this now?" If you have small children it is important to set a precedent early in their education of the importance of attendance, of turning in homework, of finishing what they start even if it isn't fun. Because these are the issues they will have to face in the teenage years but much more intensely. If your child (or your child's friends, or neighbor kids, etc.) knows you are there to help and will encourage no matter what there will be more chance they won't drop out. I know this is cliche, but our children are our future. Let's take care of it.