Several COPT students, leadership, and affiliated faculty attended or spoke at the Let’s Move! Pennsylvania Conference held at the Penn Stater Conference Center on October 8, 2014 (sponsored by the Highmark Foundation and in partnership with Penn State Cooperative Extension). Conference participants were a mix of researchers and practitioners in the field working with children and families in childcare settings, schools, and communities.
Dr. Jennifer Savage Williams, COPT co-program director, gave the keynote speech, “Starting Early: Partnerships as keys to childhood obesity prevention.” Dr. Savage Williams focused on the importance of the first few years of life for intervening with young children. Helping caregivers become responsive feeders was a key message and she shared interesting data from projects coming out of the Center for Childhood Obesity Research, where she is interim director. The lion wished her good luck pre-talk.
Dr. Savage Williams w/ the Nittany Lion
After the keynote there were three sessions and participants could choose to attend talks focusing on each of the three levels (childcare, schools, and communities).
Dr. Cynthia Stifter, Professor of Human Development and Family Studies and Psychology here at Penn State (pictured below), gave a talk in the childcare track entitled “Caregiving, child temperament, and self regulation: Pathways to childhood obesity.” She covered the basics of self regulation and stressed the importance of caregivers attending to each child’s individual needs as they learn to regulate their emotions and eating behavior.
Dr. Lori Francis Associate Professor of Biobehavioral Health and Center for Family Research in Diverse Contexts at Penn State (pictured below), spoke in the afternoon childcare track on “More jicama please! Increasing food literacy as means of improving children’s dietary patterns.” She described an intervention she is working on that aims to teach children about foods (e.g., how they are grown, what they look like, what they taste like, how much they cost) to increase children’s consumption of vegetables.
During lunch, participants enjoyed recipes created for the Let’s Move! Kids’ State Dinner and heard a talk by the 2014 PA winner, Hannah Foley. Chef Bill Scepansky (pictured below) did a cooking demonstration to show school practitioners what they could do on a limited time and budget to get kids excited about eating a healthy dish. He prepared an italian zucchini and summer squash side with onions and garlic – the adults in the room were certainly drawn in by the smell, so it’s easy to imagine it working well with kids!
The day ended with more intimate roundtable discussions of projects and a final call to action by Dr. Marilyn Corbin, Penn State Cooperative Extension Associate Director. We all play a role in reducing the prevalence of childhood obesity by modeling healthy eating and activity behaviors, as well as creating environments that help our children learn how to make the best choices for their bodies and minds. Let’s Move on this Pennsylvania!
COPT fellows Julia Bleser (Left) and Katherine Balantekin (right) ready to take on the charge with the lion.
