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 By: Shannon Clark
While back in the day you'd hardly ever see a childhood who was overweight, in today's times, it's more uncommon to see a child who isn't overweight. By simply walking into any school in North America, the growing rate of obesity will become clearly evident, as you'll not only see many kids who are riddled with weight problems, but there's a good chance you'll see a great many of them consuming junk food at that exact moment. Obesity Articles: Everywhere you turn there is mass marketing being targeted towards young children and teenagers, crowding out what marketing efforts are going into actually making smart choices - choices that will promote good health over the long run. To make matters worse, parents are faced with busier and busier schedules these days, meaning less thought and effort going into planning school lunches or even family meal times together.
All it takes is $20 given to a child to basically set them up for a day filled with junk food - since there likely is no shortage of options right on the school premise. More and more schools are starting to take a more active role in offering healthier choices, but the good old standby's of fries, burgers, grilled cheese, chips, and pop do make up the standard fare for the lunchtime meal. While these types of foods are easy to spot and thus you'd think would be easy to avoid, it's sometimes the seemingly healthy ones that sneak into the diet of our children that really cause problems.
  Click Image To Enlarge.More Schools Are Starting To Offer Healthier Choices. For instance, take those typical 'real fruit snacks'. How much 'real fruit' is actually in there? Not much. But yet, some adults don't yet understand this, so they send those snacks off with their kids, thinking they're doing their part to really battle obesity. Guess again. While educating parents is definitely a step that has to be taken, educating children, particularly those in the early teen years is equally important. At these ages, many times it's not even going to matter what the parents are doing, the teens are going to eat how they please. By making them more aware of these consequences and getting into better habits, we will really battle this serious problem that's rapidly becoming overwhelming.
"The biggest contributor to childhood obesity is lifestyle," says Melvin Royster, president of Body Styles By Mel, a company based out of Maryland that runs an entire program devoted to getting kids more active. "Families are busy and everyone is looking for that quick meal - the easy way out. Even if the food suggests it is low fat or low sugar, this doesn't necessarily mean it contains healthy ingredients".
First, it's important to keep in mind there are really two key components that are at play with the growing rate of childhood obesity. Many of us are quick to blame the diets of our kids - which is definitely valid, however a lack of physical activity is also a very big issue these younger individuals face. "Kids are too busy playing games and on the phone with their friends. Gym classes seem to be lacking in the school systems, and if a child isn't involved in some kind of sport, he or she might only see about an hour or two of physical activity each week," explains Melvin. "This isn't even close to enough to be called 'physical activity".
 Click Image To Enlarge.Kids Are Too busy Playing Video Games. Now we are starting to see more options available to get our kids active such as the very popular Nintendo Wii games, but even still, this in itself is unlikely to keep their attention long enough to instill better habits with regards to activity over the long term. Melvin, in his experience, says that the best way to get kids to be more active is to really focus on creating daily activities that they enjoy and then incorporating them right in with their daily schedule. By having them become a part of what they do every single day, you'll definitely be increasing the chances that they stick with the good habit. Melvin recommends creating games with basic movements such as jumping, running, crawling, throwing, and climbing. These are all action patterns that the kids are familiar with and can usually execute without too much difficulty.
If you put too much focus on the traditional sports, you'll always have a good number of kids who simply don't like that sport, or don't have the coordination or skill level to perform it well enough that they feel confident in playing. Activity does not need to meet organized activities. It can just as easily be anything that gets the body moving.
Once you've got the activity factor covered, then you definitely do need to step in and think about the nutritional factors. Simply controlling portion sizes with some kids can work if they typically really overdo it with the amount of food they're eating, but very often they may just need a full diet overhaul. One big thing to keep in mind is limiting their intake of fructose and corn syrup, as these will very rapidly contribute to weight gain. The biggest contributor of both of these in most diets will be with soda, candy, and processed foods, so eliminating them will be a huge step ahead.
 Click Image To Enlarge.Eliminating These Foods Will Be A Huge Step Ahead. In addition to packing healthier lunches with your kids, it's also going to be important to model good behavior yourself. Having meals together - as much as possible, will help with this, as will being sure whatever food you eat in front of them is a healthy choice (your choice of snacks, etc). Kids really are watching you so it's essential that you demonstrate good habits if you want them to incorporate these habits into their lifestyle.
Note too that with many kids, getting them to eat healthier can be as simple as say giving them a dip to have alongside their raw vegetables. Very often simple changes or additions to healthier foods will up the taste factor and make your kids more interested in choosing those over a choice that is less healthy.
If you feel as though you've been trying really hard to get your child more involved in exercising and eating right but are still not making progress, you might really want to consider consulting a fitness professional, recommends Melvin. Many parents mistakenly believe that teens should not be weight training at all, but this is not necessarily the case.
If they are shown correct form and are lifting using lower weights or just their body weight, they can definitely get involved with strengthening activities and show good benefits from it. Not only will strength training help them build stronger bones, but it will also help them put up a better fight toward weight gain because of the fact that the more muscle mass they have, the higher their metabolic rate will be.
A certified fitness professional will be able to show them exercises that they can do without putting them at high risk for injury and also be sure they're using correct form throughout. Injury Prevention Articles: So, make sure if you're a parent, you're doing what you can to promote a healthy lifestyle among your children and teens. It is a big battle to try and fight, but with small steps at a time, it can be manageable. If you'd like to speak with Melvin more about what you can do to help keep your kids more active and eating right, you can contact him at Mel@bodystylesbymel.com or visit him online to read more about his programs at www.bodystylesbymel.com. Recommend this article to a friend by e-mail here! Visitor Reviews Of This Article!
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