AISD Looks at A New Program to Aid in Child Nutrition

A.I.S.D. schools already have the Fitnessgram in place, but this new program that the district is looking at implementing will offer even more nutritional assistance for their students.

When assessing the nutrition of students there is a process that needs to take place.

"The first step that we need to find out from students is what they know," explains Joann Knox, Director of A.I.S.D.'s Child Nutrition Department.

After determining this information, then the second step comes.

"Which is telling them how to use that knowledge," Knox continues.

According to their website, Nutrigram is a fairly new program that has been developed to have an informative conversation with children, parents and teachers about making healthy choices.

"I think anytime you give students knowledge, you give them power to choose their healthy eating habits," says Ansleigh Rowan.

Rowan is a dietician at Hendrick Medical Center that supports initiatives like Nutrigram.

"It's healthy eating and exercise that combats childhood obesity," says Rowan.

The Nutrigram program in conjunction with Fitnessgram would be very effective for promoting healthy lifestyles to A.I.S.D. students.

Rowan says, "By assessing what they need to learn and by allowing the students to have the knowledge to choose healthier foods, then you're going to see that you end up with healthier students."

Since the program targets third, fourth, and fifth graders, there is an interactive portion that allows students to learn through a computer game system.

"Students will actually have a fun way of learning what's best for their body," says Knox.

Through this program, nutritionist hope it will help students adopt healthy nutrition as a lifestyle and not just something they do at school.

Knox says, "The children can take that home to the parents and say, this is what i learned today, could we do this at home, and that's the ultimate goal."

For the first year, Nutrigram comes at no cost for elementary schools in the state of Texas.

At this time A.I.S.D. will not make it mandatory for their schools to participate, but hope that many will choose to do so.