George Graham, PhD

How can parents tell how active their kids are in general?

Kids like gadgets, and pedometers are handy devices parents can have kids wear to tell how active they are. And they're not intrusive. Parents don't need to mention 10,000 steps, which is a benchmark we're hearing more and more. The point is to see how many steps a child get steps get in a typical day. I worry about parents who force their children to get an hour of physical activity, or if they get a pedometer, to get 10,000 steps. The best approach is to celebrate what a child does and aim for a little bit more each day.

If kids play organized sports, can parents assume their kids get all the physical activity they need?

It depends. You have to look at the individual child. In a Little League baseball game, a child in the outfield may not run two minutes. If they strike out, they don't run at all. The same is true for soccer. You see kids who get remarkably little activity because they don't move much and others who are all over the field. An interesting experiment that parents can do is to bring a stop watch and observe their youngster doing a sport. They should start the watch every time their child jogs, runs, skates, or does anything that's walking or above. This will answer the question of physically active they actually are.

Look for Part 2 of Dr. Graham's interview August 11

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