This week’s spotlight shines on the Kids Take Heart program offered by The Hope Heart Institute, an organization in Bellevue, Washington that focuses on cardiovascular disease prevention.

Program Basics
Kids Take Heart (KTH) is a health and fitness curriculum that includes anatomy, fitness, nutrition, stress and goal-setting.  It was developed and piloted by certified teachers in nearly 20 districts and over 60 schools and 650 classrooms.  KTH was designed as a tool to equip children in third, fourth and fifth grades to make lifestyle choices that promote fitness, health and wellness and lessen the likelihood of cardiovascular disease. 

An online training component provides graduate continuing education credits or clock hours for teachers, and allows teachers to schedule a curriculum kit (including all lesson materials) for two months.  After the program is completed, students will be able to:
     • Identify components, functions, and diseases of the cardiovascular system.
     • Recognize and evaluate risk factors, warning signs, and prevention strategies (i.e. healthy eating and active living) for cardiovascular disease.
     • Create and implement a personal wellness plan targeting nutrition and physical activity.
Kids Take Heart also involves student health ambassadors promoting heart health information among families and the greater community. 

In addition to emphasizing 60 minutes or more of physical activity daily, the KTH fitness unit helps students integrate active lifestyles, the FITT (frequency, intensity, time and type) principle and components of health-related fitness (i.e. flexibility, muscular strength, muscular endurance and cardiorespiratory endurance).  Throughout the unit, students participate in a series of physical activities and calculate their median pulse.  This helps them determine which physical activity level they fall within most days of the week so they can determine individual daily amounts.   In the end, students communicate the concept of energy balance – the intake of quality foods in the right quantity expended by physical activity.

Teachers can implement the program during PE classes, in various grade level classrooms, or some combination of the two.  KTH could also be used in an after-school program, through the local Parks & Recreation Department or Boys & Girls Clubs.  The program incurs little to no cost for school districts (or other venues).

Measuring Success
Teacher evaluations and student health logs determine the impact of the program.  The evaluations provide information on the structure and content of training, appropriateness of curriculum, ease of use with kit materials as well as the total number of students reached.  Student health logs show nutrition and physical activity goals that students set, as well as their progress in reaching their goals over a two week period.

Challenges
Carly Meiser, CHES, serves as the Education and Community Outreach Assistant for The Hope Heart Project.  When asked about program challenges, she said, “With school budget cuts, the pressure of standardized tests, and so many programs competing for time within the school day, health and physical education programs are either being pushed to the back burner or off the burner entirely even as the number of children who are overweight or obese rises.”  This is likely a challenge that is echoed among school-based programs nationwide.

Lessons Learned
Ms. Meiser shared that flexibility has been the program’s key to success, “We piloted the original program several years ago, and continue to modify it for improvement based on feedback and changing needs of diverse populations.  One tip would be to create a program that can be altered to meet different needs.  Having a “menu” of items for folks to select from helps us piece together what a group needs most.”

What are some other creative ways that student ambassadors could be used to affect change in their communities?  Share your thoughts & experiences by submitting a comment, below.

This week we would like to spotlight the Hip Hop Healthy Heart Program for Children™ (Hip Hop), a comprehensive wellness program bringing together physical education, music, and arts in grade K-6th.

The Program Basics

Hip Hop works through wellness education that flows from teacher, to student, to family and the community at large. It requires parents/guardian/mentors to be involved in training on a daily basis, not only helping to reinforce the lessons at home, but also by personally participating in the President’s Active Lifestyle Award Program (PALA). It has 8 multidiciplinary modules and inspires kids to participate by recognizing their achievements with:

• Award certificates for completion of each module
• Certificate of Completion for the entire program.

In order to receive their final program certificate, students and an adult partner are required to register for the PALA when they start Module 1.

Measuring Success

Jyl Steinback, co-creator of the program and Executive Director of Shape Up US mentioned two ways in which Hip Hop is evaluated:

• Educational Assessment: Students are required to complete a written test to assess their comprehension of the topic. Upon passing each module test, students will receive a module certificate of completion and will be eligible for additional awards and prizes.

• Health Assessment: To make sure that the positive lifestyle lessons taught in Hip Hop are truly making a difference, Shape Up US has partnered with HeartSmartKids to track each student’s health progress. Anthropometric data, lifestyle factors, and family history are assessed and tracked using this system.
  

Challenges

Steinbeck states that, “in some cases, students may not have a parent, guardian or partner/mentor available, or able to participate.” In such cases, she suggests that instructors help students partner with another role model so that they can participate in the program: older siblings; grandparents; recent retiree volunteer - Check www.AARP.org ; student mentor from a local high school as part of the high school’s community service curriculum.

Implementing a Similar Program in Your Community

Use existing infrastructure- The Hip Hop model relies on training educators, healthcare professionals and others who work with groups of children. This creates a program with controlled costs because it builds on existing infrastructure. In your community, try building upon existing infrastructures to implement your program. 

Engage parents and guardians- To help engage partners to get the maximum benefit of Hip Hop:

• Letters to send home to parents that provides parents with information about the curriculum prior to starting it
• Parent, guardian or partner/mentor contracts for each module

Reach out to encourage participation-

• Scheduling a group meeting to discuss the curriculum
• Send home personal invitations to the group meeting and ask parent/guardians to RSVP by a specific date.
• Telephone parents who do not respond and encourage them to participate
  

Don’t forget potential resources in your community- Hip Hop is designed to be taught many different types of teachers. Programs like this can be taught by:

• Public/Private School Teachers as part of their regular curriculum
• Home School Instructors
• PE Instructors
• Fitness Instructors at Health Clubs, After School Programs, YMCA, etc.
• Park and Recreation Instructors

Have you used existing infrastructure to implement a physical activity program? How?

This week, we spotlight two national efforts to promote community-level change:

HHS Secretary Sebelius Announces the Availability of Recovery Act Funds for Community Prevention and Wellness Initiative  (Source:  U.S. Department of Health and Human Services)  Ten million dollars of Recovery Act funds have been allocated to help communities decrease smoking and obesity, increase physical activity and improve nutrition.

First Lady Michelle Obama joins U.S. Soccer Foundation...support of the Soccer Foundation’s 25 city Passback Tour in partnership with the National Alliance for Hispanic Health  (Source:  U.S. Soccer Foundation)  First Lady promotes the partnership responsible for establishing free soccer clinics/health screenings in communities across the country.

In your opinion, how can the Federal government most effectively leverage its resources to promote change at the community level?