Daily HealthBeat Tip

Navajo games

From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I'm Ira Dreyfuss with HHS HealthBeat.

Kids play the games they learn, if they learn to play at all. And in the Navajo Reservation about 75 miles from Flagstaff, Arizona, young schoolkids are learning what could be called Native American games. Program leader Tara Gene of the Coconino County, Arizona, Health Department is Navajo:

"The kids' reaction to the program is awesome. They don't need a lot of equipment. They just need basically just other kids wanting to play." (seven seconds)

An example: Running a relay race carrying stones on two sticks, as if the stones were hot. Carrying heated stones dates from days when heated stones were used in cooking.

Besides physical activity, the program Eat and Play the Native Way tries to turn kids toward more healthy foods, away from the snack-type stuff.

Eat and Play the Native Way holds a 2005 Secretary's Innovation in Prevention award from HHS.

Learn more at www.hhs.gov.

HHS HealthBeat is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I'm Ira Dreyfuss.

Last revised: November 23, 2005

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