Pilot-testing CATCH Early Childhood

Abstract

Background:The literature on theoretically-based programs targeting healthy nutrition and physical activity in preschools is scarce. Purpose: To pilot test CATCH Early Childhood (CEC), a preschool-based nutrition and physical activity program among children ages three to five in Head Start. Methods: The study was conducted in two Head Start centers (N=75 children, their parents; 9 teachers). CEC was implemented by trained teachers over six weeks in fall 2008. Qualitative data on feasibility and acceptability was collected using post-intervention parent and teacher focus groups and lesson plan evaluation forms. Pre-to-post intervention changes in children's fruit and vegetable intake and physical activity at school were evaluated. Results: Results showed good feasibility and acceptability for the classroom curriculum, activity box and parent tip-sheets. There was a trend towards an increase in children's fruit, 100% fruit juice and vegetable intake and mean minutes of physical activity at school pre-to-post intervention. However, this increase was not significant. Discussion: The CEC program showed good feasibility and acceptability in the study population. Further evaluation of behavioral outcomes using a larger sample and a prospective design is needed. Translation to Health Education Practice: These results provide information important for developing and implementing evidence-based programs in preschools.

A socio-ecological approach to physical activity interventions in childcare: a systematic review

“…Twelve studies were rated moderate in quality [37-48]. Of the remaining four studies, with low quality ratings, two focused on exploring children’s PA patterns during a short intervention [49,50] and two modified the outdoor play environment [51,52].…”

“…The study design section was assessed as strong in fifteen of the cluster-randomized controlled trials (RCT) [30-42,44,47] and as moderate in one quasi-experimental study [45]. The designs of the remaining studies were rated as weak, as they were either case–control studies [50], before/after studies [43,48,49,52] or lacked a control group [46,51]. Eight studies were reported to be pilot, preliminary or feasibility studies [30,37,38,44,48,49,51,52].…”

“…The designs of the remaining studies were rated as weak, as they were either case–control studies [50], before/after studies [43,48,49,52] or lacked a control group [46,51]. Eight studies were reported to be pilot, preliminary or feasibility studies [30,37,38,44,48,49,51,52]. Seven studies focused on subsamples of childcare children (i.e.…”

“…low socioecomic or migrant background or specific ethnicity) [30,35,37,39,41,42,46]. Nine studies reported that their designs were grounded in behavior theory [34,35,39,41,42,45-48]. Only three of the RCTs reported on whether the method of random allocation was concealed [35,44,47] and five on whether the outcome assessor (s) was blinded [31,35,41,44,47].…”

“…Seventeen studies were carried out in the United States [30,31,34,36-43,45,46,48-51]. Four studies were carried out in Europe (two in Belgium [32,52], one in Switzerland [35], one in Scotland [47]), one in Australia [44] and one in the Middle East (Israel) [33].…”