March is National Nutrition Month®
Step Up to Nutrition and Health

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The food and physical activity choices made today — and every day — affect your health and how you feel today and in the future. Eating right and being physically active are keys to a healthy lifestyle. What to eat if I want to use the Dietary Guidelines?

Click here for examples of healthy eating recipes.

	Find your balance between food and physical activity. Regular physical activity is important for your overall health and fitness, plus it helps control body weight, promotes a feeling of well-being, and reduces the risk of chronic diseases.

Test your nutrition IQ with a quiz.

Test your own physical activity and nutrition levels.

Here’s an easy to read handout on rules for healthy eating.

Ideas for Community Activities for Nutrition Month

• Local Proclamation — One option to bring attention to the problem is to have a local official (your mayor, tribal village chief, etc.) declare a local nutrition month, week or day. It helps if you provide a proclamation for them to consider. This is a template from the national nutrition month site.
• Press Release — You may wish to issue a press release to your local newspaper, radio, and/or television station announcing nutrition month and any events you have planned. Here are some suggestions from the National Nutrition Month website that you may want to use as a starting point for your local press release.
• Newsletter articles are a good way to get information out. This is a draft article you may want to include in your own newsletter, and/or ask other organizations to run.
• Classroom activities — The American Dietetics Association has come up with some great ideas to incorporate into the classroom. You could offer to go into the schools or share these ideas with teachers in your community.
• Radio and CB ads and public service announcements
• Community Forum — A community forum is always a great way to bring attention to the issue. There are a number of different ways you can approach this. It can be a stand alone event or part of an existing group meeting.
• This PowerPoint slide presentation (PDF of presentation) can be used in its entirety or parts of it to help people understand the need to balanced nutrition and physical activity.
• A panel discussion can take place at an existing meeting or as a special event. Identify three to five people in your community who represent different parts of the message you want to convey. For example, you may decide the primary message you wish to get out to your community is that it is important to eat 5 or more fruits and vegetables a day. You may choose to have a medical provider, a local nutrition expert, someone from the local grocery store, and your WIC Coordinator to serve on your panel. Generally each one will have a set amount of time to talk about their perspective, and then you open it up to questions from the audience. It is always a good idea to develop some questions for the facilitator to ask.
• A Brown Bag Lunch with a Power Point, a panel presentation, or general group discussion is a good way to pull together busy people.
• You may consider hosting a Nutrition Health Fair, inviting your local partners to help put this event together.

Other event ideas are available at the American Dietetic Association website.

Links to Additional Nutrition Resources

Tell us what you are doing to promote Nutrition Month.

Do you have a question or need more information?

Karol Fink, M.S., R.D.
Nutrition Specialist
State of Alaska Obesity Prevention and Control
Phone: 907-269-3457
Fax: 907-269-5446
karol_fink@health.state.ak.us