Advertising Disclaimer
Published online November 16, 2009
PEDIATRICS Vol. 124 No. 6 December 2009, pp. 1650-1659 (doi:10.1542/peds.2009-0952)
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Submit an eLetter
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when eLetters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow E-mail this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My File Cabinet
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via CrossRef
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by McWilliams, C.
Right arrow Articles by Ward, D. S.
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by McWilliams, C.
Right arrow Articles by Ward, D. S.
Related Collections
Right arrow Office Practice
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Facebook   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

SPECIAL ARTICLE

Best-Practice Guidelines for Physical Activity at Child Care

Christina McWilliams, MPHa, Sarah C. Ball, MPH, RDa, Sara E. Benjamin, PhD, MPH, RDb, Derek Hales, PhDa, Amber Vaughn, MPH, RDa, Dianne S. Ward, EdDc

a Center for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention
c Department of Nutrition, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina
b Department of Ambulatory Care and Prevention, Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Boston, Massachusetts

Research has indicated that the child care center is a very strong predictor of preschool-aged children's physical activity levels, making this an important setting to help young children obtain physical activity that is appropriate for their health and development. However, some evidence suggests that organized child care may not adequately support children's physical activity needs. Although many organizations provide recommendations, guidelines, or standards for motor skill development and physical activity opportunities, no set of guidelines exist that directly target the overall physical activity environment at child care. Because of the lack of comprehensive recommendations, the Nutrition and Physical Activity Self-assessment for Child Care best-practice guidelines for healthy weight development were created on the basis of an extensive review of existing guidelines, research evidence, and expert review. The purpose of this article is to present these physical activity best-practice guidelines and provide data on how these guidelines compare to current practice in a large sample (N = 96) of child care centers in North Carolina. These best-practice guidelines include recommendations for 8 unique components of the child care environment, including active opportunities, fixed play environment, portable play environment, sedentary opportunities, sedentary environment, staff behavior, staff training/education, and physical activity policies. Our results showed that only a few of the best-practice guidelines were achieved by a majority of the 96 North Carolina child care centers that participated in this study. Establishing comprehensive guidelines for physical activity at child care could result in higher activity levels and healthier children, but more research is needed.

Key Words: child care • physical activity • environment • guidelines

Abbreviations: NASPE—National Association for Sport and Physical Education • NAPSACC—Nutrition and Physical Activity Self-assessment for Child Care • EPAO—Environmental and Policy Assessment and Observation • ECERS—Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale

Accepted Jun 10, 2009.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Facebook Facebook   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?