Canadian kids score failing grades on physical activity report card

The results of a report recently released by Active Healthy Kids Canada beg a question parents dread, “Are we driving our kids to unhealthy habits?”

The answer – as revealed through an assessment of 17 different indicators of physical activity levels in children and youth – yields a grim result.

Canadian kids received a “D” grade for active transportation and “F” for sedentary behaviour, failing grades in the category, which rates behaviours that contribute to overall physical activity levels.

According to parents, 24 per cent of five to 17-year-olds in Canada use active modes of transportation – walking, biking, in-line skating and skateboarding – to get to and from school each day. In addition, a recent Canadian survey found that although 58 per cent of parents walked to school when they were kids, only 28 per cent of their children walk to school today.

The report argues kids that are driven to and from school may be robbed of an important source of daily physical activity – a trip of less than one kilometre can translate to more than 2,000 additional steps per day.

“There’s really no excuse in our community not to be moving around,” said Glenn Wilson, physical education instructor at Leo Nickerson Elementary School. Wilson said he urges his own students and the athletes he coaches to walk or bike to practice – to get in that 20 extra minutes of physical activity – whenever possible.

Both Wilson and the report note that distance between home and school is one of the strongest reasons why children and youth aren’t walking or biking. However, a sizeable proportion of school vehicle traffic comes from parents whose children live within a reasonable walking distance.

Bev Esslinger, executive director of the provincial initiative Safe Healthy Active People Everywhere (SHAPE), said factors such as weather, traffic safety and stranger danger also impede active transportation. Parents will often be more open to letting their kids walk to school if they’re not walking alone.

“Walking school buses and walking buddies are two strategies that have been very positive,” said Esslinger, adding the walking buddies program – where kids walk with a friend or a small group – has been easier to implement than walking school buses – where children walk together in a group, guided by one or more parent volunteers.

SHAPE works with schools to implement these strategies as well as school travel planning, to increase active transportation. School travel planning consults with community stakeholders to improve school infrastructure (bike shelters, bike racks), engineering (pedestrian crossings, sidewalks, signage) and education on traffic safety for pedestrians and cyclists, factors that affect community mobilization.

“We say it’s not just a school problem, it’s a community problem,” explained Esslinger.

The report by Active Healthy Kids Canada stated parents may feel they are keeping their children safe by driving them to school and activities, but are actually contributing to increased traffic volumes and thus the risk of road accidents.

Esslinger and Wilson encourage parents to start with small steps. If parents park even a block away from the school when dropping their kids off, it will decrease school traffic congestion, not to mention improve air quality, reduce stress, increase social opportunities and contribute to overall physical health.