HEALTH AND FITNESS HIGHLIGHTS              
by Debra D'Acquisto (about Debra)

Many of you subscribers have returned from the 2009 American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance national conference in Tampa, Florida. If you haven’t, then I am sure you know someone who has because you have heard the excitement in their voice, or witnessed the enthusiasm in the classroom that has been noticeably notched up a bit. These overt behaviors are what can happen to you when you attend and participate in a professional development seminar, workshop, or conference. You come home with a shot in the arm, energizing you with having seen, done, or heard about the latest trends in fitness and fitness products, programs and games to teach, ideas to try, or philosophies to ponder.

Networking is a wonderful thing. We’re able to communicate with others about what is going on in your fitness/academic/classroom world, and be enlightened by the diversity on common ground and for the common good. You may wonder if being a specialist is really what you want to be. Or, does doing-it-all and being the ultimate consummate at all things sound like you? Perhaps you have a preference to spend some time on a program and you just don’t think it is appropriate for your particular grade level. You may discover, through networking, that programs that you had never thought would work can actually work for you. Having the opportunity to meet other professionals who work with similar or dissimilar age level students brings plenty to the table to talk about. Let’s talk skill levels, gadgets, time management, program design, special need students, a new way to deliver a lesson, to close it, what makes the students tick, and what makes you tick!

Networking is wonderful. Be sure to ask someone you know who went to AAPHERD to chat about what they experienced. We don’t always get the opportunity to share the good news when we get back to our former routine.

Speaking of good news, I’d like to share with you many of the highlights of the professional conference I attended the week prior to AAHPERD national conference. Atlanta, Georgia, was the site of the American College of Sports Medicine Health and Fitness Summit. The Summit is meant to bridge the gap between research and science with the hands-on fitness professional practitioner. The Summit, as all conferences do, had its keynote lecturers and several outstanding presentations and workouts embedded in nine different tracks. It is very hard to choose what you want to do, or who you want to see when your interests are diverse, so you do the best you can and look for repeat presentations.

Within the nine tracks; Nutrition, Special Populations, Exercise Program Design, Sports Medicine, Personal Training and Fitness Assessment, Business Management and Professional Development, Mind/Body, Strategies for Behavioral Change, and Worksite Health Promotion available, I had very full days attending presentations, and gathering information about the presentations, that had conflicting hours with the one’s I did attend.

The intent of this month’s Health and Fitness article is to share with you information that I thought was especially pertinent to those of you teaching in the K- 12 arena. and, perhaps less important to the K – 12 arena, but topics that may be of interest to you as a physical education professional. The information that follows is just a small snapshot of what was part of a fabulous ACSM Summit meeting.

NUTRITION

Among the five nutritional topics presented by well-respected individuals in the field, I chose to attend “Snacking: What’s the Point?” by Kristine Clark, PhD, of Penn State University. She delivered a presentation that examined the history of snacking, traditional explanations of snacking behavior, and the point of having a snack. It’s probably not new to you that we tend to snack out of hunger, boredom, temptation, stress, as a needed energy source, avoiding glycogen depletion, and for health benefits. Children and teens need to snack as their bodies are in their formative years of growing. It was suggested that children lack adequate amounts of calcium, potassium, iron, magnesium, vitamins E, D, B12, fiber, and folic acid in their diets. So, children and teens need to snack to maintain levels of nutrient shortages. Dr Kristine Clark reported on an association between the small daily hassles of life with an increased consumption of high fat and high sugar between meal snack foods and a perceived reduction of vegetable consumption. Overall, the “bad” snacks are the snacks that provide extra calories from less nutritious foods eaten during times of stress and boredom.

Theories of snacking can get more complex. Dr. Kristine Clark cited results of studies that looked at, for example, the weight gain of a child with snacking and having a lean mother, the association between television viewing and snacking, proportioned snack packages and calories from snack consumption, and personality types and snacking. I came away with a better idea of how snacking plays a positive role in our daily lives and how to justify appropriate snacking.

Four books worth taking a look at are: 1) If the Buddha Came to Dinner: How to Nourish Your Body and Your Spirit by Hale Sofia Schatz and Shira Shaiman, 2) The Zen of Eating by Ronna Kabatznick, 3) Eating Mindfully by Susan Albers and 4) 12 Weeks to Mindful Eating by Donald Altman, although the last time I looked on Amazon it was unavailable.

SPECIAL POPULATIONS

Wayne Westcott, PhD CSCS is best known as the fitness research director of the Quincy branch Keeping Fit Program, South Shore YMCA, and as a consultant to the US Military, American Council on Exercise, American Senior Fitness Association, and the National Youth Sports Safety Foundation.

One of his presentation at the ACSM Summit focused on, not surprising, Youth Strength Training. He presented results from current research conducted in the area of standard physical activity and strength training, strength training and youth strength development, injury risk and skeletal concerns, and body weight and elastic band exercises. To summarize his presentation, Dr. Westcott provided three simple take home tips: 1) Youth strength training is an effective intervention for improving physiological factors including body composition, 2) Youth strength training also is effective for improving psychological factors which include self esteem, and 3) Skeletal development in youth is not adversely affected by strength training. In fact, it has been shown to significantly increase bone mineral density in preadolescents. Let me remind you of the current youth strength training guidelines.

Exercises: 4 – 12 per session
Sets: 1 -3 per exercise (12 total sets per session)
Repetitions: 10 -1 5 per set
Frequency: 2 non consecutive days (Many studies have reported excellent results strength training 2 days per week.)
Progression: add 1 – 3 lbs upon completing 15 reps
Speed: 4 – 5 seconds per repetition
Range: full ROM
Warm - up and cool - down: aerobic activity and physical skills

Check out the following two references to know more about the research behind Dr Westcott’s findings.

SPECIAL POPULATIONS / VENDOR

Joel Dinnerman of Flaghouse represented the best and most comprehensive array of equipment in the area of adapted physical education and recreation, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech and assisted technology, movement and vestibular stimulation, and daily living aides that I’ve ever seen. I highly recommend you check out their site (www.flaghouse.com) and their on-line catalog to see what can help your students in your program.

Shellie Pfohl represented HOPsports, a state of the art training system. The HOPSports system promises to promote dynamic physical activity through the implementation of current exercise trends and social messaging onto a multi-screen. You have got to check this system out for yourself at www.hopsports.com to see what you think.

EXERCISE PROGRAM DESIGN

James Skinner, PhD Professor Emeritus, Indiana University School of Health, Physical Education and Recreation summarized various ways exercise intensity could be expressed. His presentation reviewed the evidence on intensities that appear to be effective in exercise programs for various ages. General advice can be given to young, active, and healthy persons, whereas the portion of the population that includes the sedentary, the aged, those with more health problems and the elite athlete need more individualized exercise prescriptions. Dr Skinner elaborated on exercise intensity with regards to physical activity and mortality, volume vs. intensity, response of lipids to training, stroke and physical activity, hypertension and training intensity, weight loss, effects of exercise on diabetes mellitus, magnitude of bone stress of exercise and osteoporosis, and limitations of coronary artery disease and peripheral vascular occlusive disease with exercise duration and intensity.

Dr Skinner went on to present physiological data that would be useful information for those fitness professionals working in a clinical setting. He reminded us of the general exercise guidelines set by the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) and the American Heart Association (AHA). More individualized exercise prescription requires obtaining more information from more in-depth exercise testing. The current exercise guidelines for healthy people with no abnormalities when exercising are as follows: Moderate intensity activity 30 minutes 5 days/week or vigorous activity for 20 minutes 3 days/week.

SPORTS MEDICINE

Edward G. McFarland, MD is a professor of orthopedic surgery at Johns Hopkins University, and is the consulting team physician for the Baltimore Orioles. Dr McFarland gave a fun and informative presentation called, “Good Pain, Bad Pain: How to Know the Difference in Your Clients.” Dr McFarland discussed kinds of pain, types of soreness, pain accompanying an acute or traumatic injury, treatments and medications in an interactive forum setting using case studies, audience participation, x-rays and stories of textbook cases, as well as the not so traditional textbook cases.

Why should we, the fitness instructor, coach, physical educator, or athletic administrator care about this topic? Quite simply, the goal for our students and athletes is health and happiness, not pain and disability. We can better serve those we instruct by being more knowledgeable, and by understanding when to exercise, and when not to, so as to prevent further injury. Dr McFarland left us with four simple take home points. One, things do not hurt, swell, or get black and blue for no reason. Two, listen to the student/athlete/client because pain is real. Three, we shouldn’t work through the pain as it will only get worse. And four, if you don’t know, if you aren’t sure or if in doubt, refer to a physician.

For more information, please reference his article: McFarland EG, Compton SP, Dawson CA. Guide to Good and Bad Pain for the Health/Fitness Professional. Health and Fitness Journal Vol 7:11 – 16, 2003.

PERSONAL TRAINING AND FITNESS ASSESSMENT

“Pacing Strategy for the Transitional Athlete,” presented by Carl Foster, PhD, University of Wisconsin-La Crosse was everything I had hoped it would be. The gist of the presentation was to provide strategies for guiding individuals from basic fitness exercisers into beginning competitors. According to Dr Foster, there is a lack of information on how to advise early competitive efforts. Beyond the exercise principle of systematic progression, the newbie competitor needs to understand how to manage pacing, perception of effort, and other strategies associated with competition. The question and answer period associated with this presentation was as good as the presentation for many in the audience, as Dr Foster was able to convey practical tips.

THE FAVORITES

Two of my favorite presenters I’ve left for last, as neither ever leave you feeling that you haven’t been challenged, intrigued, thought provoked, and entertained at the same time.

Len Kravitz, PhD, from the University of New Mexico was a Keynote presenter this year. His presentation was “Stardate 2009: The Next Generation Research “To Practice” Presentation.” Dr Kravitz presented oodles of research data that is relevant to the fitness practitioner. Some of the topics of research he presented were use of pedometers, overtraining, abdominal obesity, the effects of imagery and performance, physical activity, and cancer and more. Interspersed among his topics were short video clips of exercises to WOW! I knew I wanted to try most of those exercises with free weights and the fit ball as soon as I got home! The other great thing about Dr Len Kravitz is that everything he has published, written, outlined and taught is on-line. Just Google Dr Len Kravitz for a real treat!

I mentioned earlier on in this article that good news came out of this Summit conference. Dr. Michael Bracko, Ed D, from Calgary, Canada has put his twist on the plethora of news we’re hearing about the obesity crisis, sedentary behaviors, and research findings. Let’s just stop a moment and take a look, it’s everywhere, at the statistics that are being reported in the media about overweight kids, about the inactivity epidemic, the new disease called diabesity, high risk behaviors associated with sedentary teens, and on and on. Dr. Bracko has successfully presented good news coming from the fitness industry despite the incessant need for the media to report negative findings. Dr Bracko suggests the media is biased in reporting the bad news, and that deviant behaviors are over amplified. For example, Dr. Bracko reported that USA Triathlon has seen a 23% growth per year in triathlon participation from the years 2000 to 2006. That translates into 690,000 individuals training for swim/bike/run events every year. That’s really good news! But, get this. The week after I got home from Atlanta I read the USA today newspaper. An article turned the positive facts associated with triathlons into a deadly headline reporting that triathlons pose a risk to participants that is more deadly than marathons. Why does the media do that?

The take home messages that I’d like to leave you with is that fitness industry is in good shape, and many people are having success with exercise. Exercise is Medicine is a new initiative (www.exerciseismedicine.org) that is catching on. The media is trying hard to report negative findings. Ask yourself, shouldn’t the media turn the tables around if they want to make a positive impact on exercise behavior and report what people ARE doing, not what they aren’t doing?

(pelinks4u home)