Colorado moms in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) can text peer counselors any time of day for breastfeeding advice, thanks to a new program being expanded across the state. WIC is a federal program that boosts healthcare and nutrition for vulnerable women and children. Latinos comprise nearly half of the 8.8 million WIC participants. WIC aims to improve breastfeeding rates, curb obesity, and boost early childhood development. Could texting help WIC moms get breastfeeding support they need? “We know breastfeeding is the healthiest way to feed babies, but sometimes new moms need extra support,” Heidi Hoffman, director of WIC in Colorado, said in a news release. “Using technology, we can help more moms in more places for less ...
Most early childcare providers deal with children who have experienced or will experience neglect, poverty, or other traumatic events that can harm long-term health. But not all providers know how to best help these children. Fortunately, a new report from Child Trends and the National Center for Children in Poverty, is giving childcare providers guidance in dealing with children of trauma.
How Early Childhood Trauma Affects Kids
Trauma is a sad fact of life for many children. Whether its child abuse or witnessing domestic violence, trauma can impair a child's body and brain development. It also can hinder learning and the ability to develop healthy relationships across the lifespan. Latino kids exposed to many traumatic events are at higher risk for obesity, asthma, heart ...
In the midst of the national opioid crisis are children. These children are dealing with traumatic events and often placed in foster care or with relative caregivers. Traumatic events hinder early childhood development and negatively impact school performance, lifelong physical and mental health, and professional success. Sadly, many Latino children do not get the services they need to heal and overcome the harmful effects of trauma. High rates of opioid and illegal substance abuse in Texas in 2015 sparked a small trauma-informed committee in San Antonio (67% Latino) to plan a trauma-informed conference to build a network of trauma-informed care in South Texas. They believe it is critical for counselors, teachers, caregivers, mental health professionals, and medical personal, ...
Math often gets a bad rap in schools. But what if students could count bikes and buses, and solve word problems about local bike lanes and bus routes? That is what's happening in Santa Monica, Calif. (18.1% Latino)—elementary students get "Math in My World" booklets with problems involving how people stay active and move around their community, like walking, biking, skating, scootering, and public transit. The booklets launched December 2017 by the city's Safe Routes to School program. "So instead of showing a six-year-old the somewhat-abstract idea that 2+1=3, they learn that Grace has 2 scooters and Sam has 1 scooter and together they have 3," wrote Jack Moreau, a transit official for the City of Santa Monica. All kids benefit of course, but this could help students ...
An initiative by the First Lady of Wisconsin to prevent and reduce childhood trauma has grown to become a dynamic collaboration, putting Wisconsin in the lead to be the first trauma-informed state. Trauma during childhood negatively affects development and physical and mental health into adolescence and adulthood. Traumatic events include: physical and emotional neglect; physical, emotional and sexual abuse; parental divorce, separation, incarceration, and substance abuse; and poverty. These are also called adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and were first studied in the 1990s. The more ACEs a child experiences, the higher their risk of chronic disease, mental illness, substance abuse, violence, teen pregnancy, incarceration, and dropping out of high school. Since the ...
Latinos are significantly more likely than whites to say that the government should do more to make sure that Americans are healthier, even if it costs the taxpayers more (63% v. 53%), according to the 2017 Healthy Americas Survey. It makes sense. Here's why: Latinos suffer worse rates of obesity and other health issues because of lack of investment in safe streets, sidewalks, and parks, as well as lack of access to healthy food, early care and education, and family support. So what exactly do Latinos want?
2017 Healthy Americas Survey
You've heard that your ZIP code is a better predictor of your health than your genetic code, right? Past policies dictated the location and quality of affordable housing, public transportation, schools, sidewalks, parks, healthy food options, ...
Imagine you're 4 years old. How would you feel going to preschool with crocodiles, elephants, and butterflies? What about learning letters while on nature walks? That childhood fantasy is reality for kids at the Will Smith Zoo School in San Antonio (68% Latino). The Zoo School, which opened in 2004 and became licensed in 2014 at the San Antonio Zoo, will expand its capacity from about 50 to more than 200 students in 2018 and become the largest nature-based preschool in the nation, SA Current reports. Zoo officials believe that learning can be as much of a serious hands-on experience as it is messy fun. "Children will spend time in nature exploring and discovering the wonders of nature," according to the Zoo School Parent Handbook. "Basic preschool concepts will be ...
U.S. Latino, black, and American Indian children have bigger obstacles to success than white and Asian children, according to a new report. The report, the Race for Results from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, scores how children are progressing on 12 key milestones from birth to adulthood. Milestones include math proficiency, graduation data, teen birth rates, employment prospects, poverty, and more. The higher the score (0-1,000), the better children fare. Latinos' actually increased to a score of 429 in 2017 from 404 in this same report from 2014. Yet this score is well below Asian (783) and white children (704), slightly ahead of African-America (369) and American Indian (413) children, and remains a "cause for deep concern," according to the report. "We will lose a ...
Many American kids eat two out of three meals at school. Schools must offer healthy food and drinks, especially for Latino students who are more likely than their peers to face an unhealthy weight, unhealthy neighborhood food options, and unhealthy early development. That's why schools should offer plain water with meals—not milk. So says a new study by University of Illinois researcher Ruopeng An, which encouraged children to drink plain water with their school lunches. This simple switch from milk to water at school could prevent more than a half-million kids from becoming overweight or obese, and trim the costs of obesity by more than $13 billion, An's study suggests. "The nutrition profile doesn't change much when people increase their plain-water intake, but we ...
