At a time when more North Carolina children are obese than ever before in history, local students and childcare professionals gathered at the Little Bites, Big Steps nutrition workshop. The workshop, hosted by the Fuquay-Varina High School Family and Consumer Sciences Early Childhood Education interns April 22, taught attendees how to encourage children to eat healthily and exercise. The workshop was the third at the high school, which holds one every other year.

“Nutrition and health understanding is particularly critical for the teachers and caregivers of young children because the habits and preferences they develop will be with them often into adulthood,” said Karen Brown, family and consumer sciences teacher, early childhood education coordinator, and career and technical education department co-chair at Fuquay-Varina High School.

Brown’s students intern three days a week at local childcare centers, working with a variety of ages.

“We founded this nutrition and health workshop as a way to bring all our early childhood education internship site directors, teachers and interns together to say thanks for participation in our program, and provide supervising teachers more tools to use in their individual centers.”

Childcare professionals earned two continuing education credits for their attendance and participation.

From creating flyers advertising the workshop to making and serving a dinner of turkey and beef casseroles, bread, fruits, vegetables, low-calorie punchbowl cake and more, to welcoming the guests, to participating in the workshop itself, the students were involved in every aspect.

“The students see the bigger picture of how our world works: continuing education, collaboration with other teachers and in the business world,” Brown said. “Everybody has to work together to create outstanding societies.”

Nannette Ausby, who presented the workshop and is both the director of Sisters’ Childcare Services in Holly Springs and a UNC TV trainer, said busy family lives and less active lives, with children playing outside less and with computer and video games more, contribute to childhood obesity.