picture of 4 yr old of what the school calls "Obese"

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  • kiachu
    kiachu Posts: 409 Member
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    According to the CDC childhood obesity has tripled in the last 30 years. Type 2 diabetes has skyrocketed amongst children.

    So maybe if parents were more inclined to parent their children's nutrition and physical habits then this type of protocol wouldn't have to exist in school.

    Instead of addressing that basic underlying fact, we have a bunch of people throwing a hissy over a letter SENT HOME TO THE PARENTS, and offer of a home visit (WHICH CAN BE DECLINED), and talk of burning down schools, physically assaulting people, temper tantrums at the school, and lawsuits.
  • mgobluetx12
    mgobluetx12 Posts: 1,326 Member
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    I hope you and her mom are sheltering her from all this nonsense.
  • slkehl
    slkehl Posts: 3,801 Member
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    My DD went through this in public school also and it's no big deal. They're weighed and measured and every child is sent home with a letter. There's no personal interpretation involved, just canned comments. My daughter was listed as being thin, her pediatrician was fine with her height and weight so there was no need to go any further. I agree with the posters that said many people don't have pediatricians and the schools try to fill that void. I live in a heavily migrant area and probably the only health feedback many of them get are from the school nurses. I really think some of you need to cut the public schools some slack. I know a couple of the nurses and they work their butts off trying to take care of all their tasks.

    This could be the situation. They might have just written down all the stats and sent out automated letters to any child that fell under a certain number range. I'm sure it's a bit unnerving for you, but I wouldn't take it personally and would just realize the schools are trying to help and that numbers don't tell the full picture.
  • slkehl
    slkehl Posts: 3,801 Member
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    On another note, I think she looks like Bindi Irwin (the Croc Hunter's daughter). Haha.

    Totally!! She's a cutie!
  • NaomiJFoster
    NaomiJFoster Posts: 1,450 Member
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    As a preschool teacher, I'm horrified that the school would tell you that. That's not how we engage families and build trusting relationships with parents. If the child is growing (taller), has energy and stamina to participate in indoor and outdoor activites, has agility and balance to do things like monkey bars, tumbling, balance beam, has flexibility and strength to do floor activites as well as sitting and standing activities...well then, that child is most likely developing just perfectly normally. When there's a real concern, we don't just jump right to labling and child and implying that the parents are doing something wrong. That's not the way to build a relationship or to help a child.
  • beautylovetruth
    beautylovetruth Posts: 130 Member
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    As a preschool teacher, I'm horrified that the school would tell you that. That's not how we engage families and build trusting relationships with parents. If the child is growing (taller), has energy and stamina to participate in indoor and outdoor activites, has agility and balance to do things like monkey bars, tumbling, balance beam, has flexibility and strength to do floor activites as well as sitting and standing activities...well then, that child is most likely developing just perfectly normally. When there's a real concern, we don't just jump right to labling and child and implying that the parents are doing something wrong. That's not the way to build a relationship or to help a child.

    This. I think there are three professional teachers in this thread from what I've seen and we all have the same view point. There are a lot of different considerations in determining health and height/weight are not the only ones. Thank you very much for pointing out these other indicators of fitness! :)
  • joselo2
    joselo2 Posts: 461
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    i dont even need to look at the pics to comment because i still strongly feel it is not the schools place to get involved, caring for kids is for the parents, not the school. Weighing kids can cause so much worry and upset and never does any good really. it should be banned.
  • Ralphrabbit
    Ralphrabbit Posts: 351 Member
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    They sent home a note saying she was" obese" and they wanted a home visit (not my home, her moms home) to disscuss nutrition to control her weight.

    and I do hope you told them to take a hike??
  • RunEatLift
    RunEatLift Posts: 68
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    Absolutely ridiculous. She's a beautiful, healthy child!
  • ruthiejewell
    ruthiejewell Posts: 134 Member
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    She looks a perfect healthy size for her height. Outrageous!!!!
  • heatherhart
    heatherhart Posts: 113 Member
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    The same thing was said about my son at his 3yr check up. I am waiting til his 4 yr check up to see what they say. He will be 4 in jan and weighs 41 lbs but he has always been in the 95% on everything he was a big baby lol 9 lbs 15 oz. By no means is your grand daughter obese its sad that a such a young age they already start kids worry about their weight.
  • fittertanme
    fittertanme Posts: 259 Member
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    that is not obese that is a normal child and how stupid and mean for them to say that and at 4 years she is still growing and will grow up ok without been labled like that have they got nothing better to go and do
  • sarahz5
    sarahz5 Posts: 1,363 Member
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    I'm sort of confused. Your granddaughter looks perfectly fine to me. However, I looked up her percentile for "weight-for-stature" according to the CDC and she's way off the charts. Then I checked her BMI - an early poster is correct that it is 20.3, but for children her age, that is way at the top of the charts and falls into the "obese" range.

    If these measurements are correct, I personally would be happy that the school mentioned it and would talk to her doctor about it. As laypersons, we aren't trained to spot all the many health issues a child may have. We outsource a lot of that to schools - schools screen for vision and hearing problems, check our children for lice, and so on. This is just another health issue that may or may not need to be addressed. They aren't insulting you, they aren't attacking your granddaughter, they just want to make sure any potential health issues are known and addressed. We are so sensitive to weight, but it's really no different than needing glasses or having a learning disability or any of the other fifty things the schools are trained to check and refer us to doctors for.

    I didn't read the first thread so I'm not sure how the school addressed this, but unless they commented on it in front of your granddaughter (which would be unnecessary and uncalled for), I don't see why there is any problem with them informing you of these facts, and any method of communication should be fine. Parents/grandparents shouldn't need to be treated with kid gloves.
  • Smokey19
    Smokey19 Posts: 796 Member
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    She is a very beautiful little girl and not obese at all. I would be so angry at the school and think about taking her to a different school.
  • reasnableblonde
    reasnableblonde Posts: 212 Member
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    The basic problem here is that a great many people have lost the ability to actually think for themselves. And, schools are monitoring things like this because a great many parents are not. If it were me, I'd send a letter back to the school telling them to mind their own business. I might also make a personal visit to the person who sent the letter, the Superintendent of the district and possibly the School Board to tell them the same thing.

    Because a great many parents have abdicated the raising of their children to the schools, we get this. A teacher, probably a health teacher, or the school nurse takes each kids weight and height and plugs it into the computer and it spits out "obese", based on a table created by some government drone who is looking at averages of millions of kids. Same said person enters it into the child's record and sends off a letter to the parents, if the computer doesn't do it for them. This person probably couldn't think for themselves if they were allowed to, so it never occurs to them to actually LOOK at the child and see that she appears healthy and active and is not even overweight, much less obese.

    Be very aware. As this sort of thing becomes more commonplace, and as we give more and more control of our children to the schools/government, the next letter that goes out will be to child protective services, or some such agency, and the home visit, the prescribed diet, etc will not be a suggestion.

    Parents need to actually start getting involved in the lives of their kids.

    Edited to add: Your granddaughter is indeed adorable. But mine is cuter, of course. And, sue the school? Are you serious? That's just what we need, another stupid lawsuit.

    BINGO.
  • rosieg1979
    rosieg1979 Posts: 99 Member
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    I'm sort of confused. Your granddaughter looks perfectly fine to me. However, I looked up her percentile for "weight-for-stature" according to the CDC and she's way off the charts. Then I checked her BMI - an early poster is correct that it is 20.3, but for children her age, that is way at the top of the charts and falls into the "obese" range.

    If these measurements are correct, I personally would be happy that the school mentioned it and would talk to her doctor about it. As laypersons, we aren't trained to spot all the many health issues a child may have. We outsource a lot of that to schools - schools screen for vision and hearing problems, check our children for lice, and so on. This is just another health issue that may or may not need to be addressed. They aren't insulting you, they aren't attacking your granddaughter, they just want to make sure any potential health issues are known and addressed. We are so sensitive to weight, but it's really no different than needing glasses or having a learning disability or any of the other fifty things the schools are trained to check and refer us to doctors for.

    I didn't read the first thread so I'm not sure how the school addressed this, but unless they commented on it in front of your granddaughter (which would be unnecessary and uncalled for), I don't see why there is any problem with them informing you of these facts, and any method of communication should be fine. Parents/grandparents shouldn't need to be treated with kid gloves.


    This. These measurements do work, and are correct for the vast majority of the people. I would be concerned that centiles wise she is really out of proportion, average height, 99percent weight. You can't just discount this, you need to get it checked out. You can't tell just from looking, especially as a society we are conditioned to be looking at fat people. Look Back at photos/videos of kids from the seventies and too our eyes they look skinny, whereas in fact they are normal. You should be able to clearly see her ribs, can you?
  • jrbb03092
    jrbb03092 Posts: 198 Member
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    I'm really surprised by all of the defensiveness in these posts.

    Fact: You can not determine whether someone is obese, overweight, underweight etc just by "looking at them". People over and under estimate the weight of people all the time. And if you are using the barometer of other kids you've seen to determine this, good luck with that. Kids don't have to look like mini-sumo wrestlers to actually be overweight or obese.

    I think that people have issues with the term "obese" as it applies to kids, but this child's BMI is > 99% for age and by definition that is "obese". The word itself is so emotionally charged but the definition as used by the school is the correct definition.

    I seriously doubt that the school or nurse told this child she was obese or fat and I don't see the harm in informing the parents about where she falls for her height and weight for her age. Her weight may not be a major issue right now but it could become an issue later if noone is paying attention. So all involved should take this as an FYI and make sure the kid is getting appropriate nutrition and exercise. That's all.

    Perhaps I'm in the minority here, but I really don't get all the outrage.

    You might be in the minority but I'm right there with you.
  • Vailara
    Vailara Posts: 2,452 Member
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    I think they will have measured her height, but I think there is some confusion. Obesity for children is measured differently than for adults. Adults count as obese if their BMI is 30 or over. That doesn't work well for children because they go through different growth stages, tending to be plumper and skinnier at different ages. So instead, they're compared to other children, and count as obese if their BMI is higher than the BMI of 95% of other children their age and sex (on the charts. I think people have become bigger since the charts were made).

    The (adorable!) little girl has been measured at an age when children tend to be skinny, and that's partly why she can be obese without looking chubby. If she continued growing along that centile, then you'd expect her to have a BMI over 30 as an adult.

    I'm just saying that to explain why she counts as obese, and not making any value judgement here. I think it's a thorny issue. I'm not sure yet how helpful it is to point out to parents when children are obese.
  • ojieuno
    ojieuno Posts: 2
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    She's not obese, people are just judgmental.
  • Sarahneedstoshrink
    Sarahneedstoshrink Posts: 32
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    There is nothing wrong with that baby!

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