Strategies

Establish a break from the school day, typically before lunch, that involves planned, inclusive, actively supervised games or activities; also called semi-structured, or structured recess

Offer group educational, social, creative, musical, or physical activities that promote social interactions, regular attendance, and community involvement among older adults

Provide education, information, counseling, and support for breastfeeding to women throughout pre- and post-natal care

Support locally-based visual, media, and performing arts initiatives for children and adults; also called participatory arts programs

Provide space to promote socializing among community members and offer programs and services such as recreational or educational activities, counseling or support services

Offer exercise classes (e.g., aerobic dance, yoga, Tai Chi, cycling, etc.) and fitness program support in community, senior, fitness, and community wellness centers

Establish shared kitchen spaces that support licensed, commercial food processing and connect specialty food processors, farmers, and others who produce value-added goods

Establish partnerships between farmers and consumers in which consumers purchase a share of a farm’s products in advance

Support temporary programs that work to energize participants to lose weight via prizes, often combined with education, weight status and food intake tracking, regular check-ins, and group support

Build, strengthen, and maintain social networks that provide supportive relationships for behavior change through walking groups or other community-based interventions

Assign higher costs to non-nutritious foods than nutritious foods via incentives, subsidies, or price discounts for healthy foods and beverages or disincentives or price increases for unhealthy choices

Enhance streetscapes with greater sidewalk coverage and walkway connectivity, street crossing safety features, traffic calming measures, and other design elements

Provide at-risk expectant parents and families with young children with information, support, and training regarding child health, development, and care from prenatal stages through early childhood via trained home visitors

Enable farmers markets to accept EBT, the electronic payment system of debit cards used to issue and redeem Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits

Provide patients with prescriptions for exercise plans, often accompanied by progress checks at office visits, counseling, activity logs, and exercise testing

Support organized social, art, or physical activities for school-aged youth outside of the school time

Offer opportunities for group purchase and distribution of selected grocery items, generally at a reduced price

Support businesses or organizations that aggregate, distribute, and market local and regional food products (e.g., fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, dairy, grains, and prepared items)

Gather food left in fields after a primary harvest, food in fields where harvesting is not profitable, or excess produce from orchards, packing houses, urban agriculture sites, etc.

Offer participants with low incomes matching funds to purchase healthy foods, especially fresh fruits and vegetables; often called bonus dollars, market bucks, produce coupons, or nutrition incentives

Teach parenting skills in a group setting using a standardized curriculum, often based on behavioral or cognitive-behavioral approaches and focused on parents of at-risk children

Provide more fresh fruits and vegetables, smaller portions, low fat, and reduced sodium or reduced sugar food options and other healthy foods at catered events

Modify the school lunch food environment or school lunch schedules by increasing the convenience of healthy foods, providing healthy options, or ensuring students have enough time to eat

Increase healthy options in vending machines by reducing the price of healthy choices, increasing the number of healthy choices compared to unhealthy choices, etc.

Teach behavioral skills that can help individuals incorporate physical activity into their daily routines

Establish policies, plans, and programs that meet the needs of all residents of a community, especially children and older adults, and promote interaction and cooperation between individuals of different generations

Return the rights to land, property, and resources to Native people as part of policies and initiatives that promote tribal sovereignty

Support a combination of land uses (e.g., residential, commercial, recreational) in development initiatives, often through zoning regulations or Smart Growth initiatives

Combine educational, environmental, and behavioral activities that increase physical activity and improve nutrition (e.g., nutrition education, aerobic/strength training, dietary prescriptions, etc.) in various settings

Deliver educational, behavioral, environmental, and other obesity prevention efforts (e.g., education classes, enhanced physical education, healthy food promotion, family outreach, etc.) in schools

Establish voluntary formal groups of residents who work together to create a unified voice, enhance living conditions in their neighborhood, and address neighborhood concerns

Provide home visiting services to low income, first time mothers and their babies, starting during pregnancy and continuing through a child’s second birthday

Offer young children opportunities to eat healthy foods and engage in physical activity by providing fresh fruits and vegetables, incorporating physical activity into daily classroom routines, etc.

Provide prescriptions with healthy eating goals for patients and families, often accompanied by progress checks at office visits; can include partnerships with local farmers markets via FVRx programs

Offer time during the school day for children to play in the gym, often during lunch period; shared use agreements can expand open gym opportunities to community members outside school hours

Allow community members to gather, socialize, walk, run, bike, skate, etc. on streets temporarily to closed to motorized traffic; also called Ciclovía programs

Incorporate classroom-based physical activities, such as classroom energizers, into academic lessons or as a break, usually for elementary students

Modify local environments to support physical activity, increase access to new or existing facilities for physical activity, or build new facilities

Place motivational signs on or near stairwells, elevators, and escalators that encourage individuals to use stairs

Lend materials, offer gathering space, and provide educational, civic, and social programming; open to the community and publicly funded

Offer opportunities for adults to play athletic games such as soccer, softball, kickball, basketball, etc. at beginner, intermediate, and competitive levels

Apologize for the history and legacy of slavery and provide direct payments or community investments to Black descendants of people enslaved in the U.S.

Promote walking and biking to school through education, incentives, and environmental changes; often called SRTS

Support programs to provide students with a nutritious breakfast in the cafeteria, from grab and go carts in hallways, or in classrooms

Establish designated areas where students can garden with guidance, often with nutrition and food preparation lessons and opportunities for taste tasting and hands-on learning

Prohibit the sale of unhealthy foods such as sugar sweetened beverages, candy, and other non-nutritious snacks at school fundraisers, often as part of a broader nutrition policy

Regulate the quality of food that can be sold to students through the National School Lunch Program (NSLP), à la carte options, vending machines, etc.

Expand or enhance school-based physical education (PE) by lengthening existing classes, increasing physical activity during class, adding new PE classes, etc.

Encourage children to spend time away from TV and other stationary screen media, often as part of a multi-faceted effort to increase physical activity and improve nutrition

Increase the price of sugar sweetened beverages (e.g., soda) by adding an excise or sales tax