Resources to help your kids get healthier!

TrainerRobin

If you have little ones in your family who you're trying to help get healthier, here are a few cool resources you may be interested in. As a part of the new national "Let's Move!" campaign to end childhood obesity, there was a new competition for Apps for Health Kids. They challenged software developers, game designers, students, and other innovators to develop fun and engaging software tools and games that drive children, especially "tweens" (ages 9-12) to eat better and be more physically active.

Submissions were due in June 2010 and the winners were recognized in September of 2010. Criteria for best tool and best game included: quality, accuracy, and content of message, potential impact on target audience, and creativity and originality.

Not sure how old your kids are or how involved you want them to be, but it might be worthwhile to take a look at the winners ... maybe something here will be helpful.

TOOLS CATEGORY:
* First Place: Pick Chow - allows children to create meals by dragging and dropping food onto their virtual plate - http://www.zisboombah.com/pickchow
* Runner Up: PapayaHead - a family Meal Planning web site that allows each family member to fill out a unique profile of likes, dislikes, allergies, and unique nutritional requirements - http://www.papayahead.com
* Honorable Mention: The Snack Neutralizer - a tool designed to open up student’s eyes to the consequences, both good and bad, associated with what they eat - http://thesnackneutralizer.com
* Popular Choice Winner: Tony's Plate Calculator - an online tool that can help you calculate the nutritional values for a single item, an entire recipe or a full day's worth of food - http://www.tonysplate.com/calculate.php
* Corporate Recognition Award: Hungry Hiker Build a Meal - ties physical activity with good eating habits in a fun and engaging way, as you build a balanced meal to fuel a hiker to the summit - http://www.dmns.org/nutrition
* GE Healthyimagination Student Award: Work It Off - mobile application for Android phones that teaches children the correlation between the calories they eat and the calories they burn - http://wio.hfoss.org

GAMES CATEGORY:
* First Place: Trainer - gives players the responsibility of caring for creatures who all have dietary and fitness needs - http://www.davidvillatoro.com/games/trainer
* Runner Up: Fitter Critters - a game where children are given responsibility to make nutritional choices for a virtual pet - http://fittercritters.com/index.php
* Honorable Mention: Smash Your Food - lets children see and hear foods like a milkshake, or a burger, explode - while learning how much sugar, salt and oil their favorite foods are hiding - http://www.foodnme.com/smash-your-food
* Popular Choice Winner: Food Buster - asks players to carefully stack food items that don't break the scale - http://www.foodbustergame.com
* Corporate Recognition Award: Food Hero - the goal of the game is to become a Food Hero by eating right and completing a set of running, biking and swimming challenges - http://healthysocial.org/foodherogame.html
* GE Healthyimagination Student Award: Trainer (see above)

HealthyishWithMaggieG

Looks like a great collection! I've been following Mayor @CoryBooker's #LetsMove tweets and they're pretty inspiring for adults too. Check him out!