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Bringing The Message Home
| "Children have
never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have
never failed to imitate them."
- James Baldwin |
The CATCH Family component is designed to get students, parents and extended
family members involved in practicing and adopting healthy eating and
physical activity behaviors at home. By doing so, the home environment
becomes an extension of the CATCH Program at school. Creating a strong
link between teachers and parents greatly enhances the chances that the
lessons learned at school will become a permanent part of a child’s
life.
CATCH Home Team will:
- Provide multiple opportunities for parents and family member to visit
the school and actively participate in CATCH and other Coordinated School
Health Program activities.
- Serve as an educational program that motivates parents to change
their own behaviors.
- Influence environmental change in the home that reflects the change
in environment in the school.
- Get families involved as much and as often as possible.
CATCH Go For Health Series
| An integral component of the CATCH curriculum is parental involvement
through homework assignments the children complete with their parents
or an adult at home or away from school. Specific assignments are
embedded in the lessons of each grade’s classroom curriculum.
Activity booklets accompany the Home Team assignments at the 3rd,
4th, and 5th grades. Upon completion of each assignment, children
earn points that are monitored by the classroom teacher. Extra points
are earned when a parent or adult participates in the assignment. |
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3rd Grade Curriculum - Hearty Heart &
Friends
Students and parents participate in Hearty Heart Home
Team. The homework projects include interesting heart healthy
eating and exercise activities with an emphasis on nutrition.
4th Grade Curriculum - Taking Off
Parents participate with their children in Stowaway to Planet
Strongheart. The activities in 4th grade follow a more consistent
pattern which includes nutrition, exercise, anti- smoking and goal
setting.
5th Grade Curriculum - Breaking Through Barriers
Students and parents participate in Health Trek…The Journey
Continues, receiving four weekly newsletters. The newsletters
include weekly tips to help the family establish permanent healthy
eating and physical activity goals. As in the 3rd and 4th grades,
students earn points for completing  the homework assignments with
bonus points awarded for parental involvement.
CATCH Family Fun Nights
An essential part of parental involvement is through participation in activities at your children’s school. CATCH Family Fun Nights provide a high energy, interactive and fun atmosphere for parents, community members, school personnel and children to come together and celebrate healthy living principles. CATCH schools are encouraged to plan and conduct a Family Fun Night each year. During the initial implementation year, Family Fun Nights are a wonderful means to introduce the school’s coordinated school health program. |
Extension of the Family Component
While the homework assignments and Family Fun Nights are an important
part of the family component, it is important to identify additional means
of getting parents to participate in the CATCH Program and solidify, for
their children, the importance of positive health behaviors. The key is
to make it easy for them to do so. For example, offer parents an opportunity
to exercise with their children by walking with them on campus before
or after school once a month, calling it Wellness Wednesdays or Fitness
Fridays. Or create a “Favorite Fruit Day” where children bring
their favorite fruit to school and eat it during a school wide snack period.
These simple, inexpensive events not only reinforce the importance of
healthy behaviors but do so with the help and participation of parents,
the most significant role model in children’s lives.
| Family & Home Team Supplementary
Resource Materials |
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November
Home Team Calendar (PDF) |
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A simple daily activity, nutrition, or health tasks to be
done individually or with the entire family. |
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Healthy
Habits at Home (PDF) |
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Simple steps that will add up to a big difference in your family's
health. |
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GO
Food Grocery Scvanger Hunt (PDF) |
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Prior to the next trip to the grocery store, have the kids write
down all the snacks they think are “healthy.” snacks.
When the shopping actually begins, have the kids find and record nutritional
information, especially fats and sugars, for the identified snacks.
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CATCH What's New! |
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Hyperlink to the Family CATCH What's New Page. New activities
and ideas posted monthly. |
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Useful Links for Families
and Kids |
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Hyperlink to the Family Helpful Links Page. |
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