Basic Information
Food & Fun After School
Food & Fun After School (© President and Fellows of Harvard College and YMCA of the USA) is a curriculum designed to develop healthy habits out of school time. Eleven teaching units help programs infuse healthy snacks and recipes, physically active games, and creative learning activities into regular program schedules. Curriculum materials are available free of charge. The Food & Fun curriculum supports the skills and development set forth by the Common Core State Standards, which have been adopted by 45 states to date.
Food & Fun materials were designed based on qualitative research conducted through a national partnership with YMCA of the USA, America's largest provider of school age childcare services. As part of the YMCA's Activate America initiative, the Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center was a partner in a pilot organizational change project (The Gulick Youth/Family Collaborative) in which a sample of YMCA childcare programs participated in a structured process to achieve higher program standards in nutrition, physical activity, and parent connectedness. All Food & Fun First Edition curriculum materials were field tested in local YMCA child care settings for acceptability, feasibility, and ease of use. Food & Fun Second Edition lesson extensions, tips sheets, assessment guides, Recipe Packet, and Snack Sense guide were reviewed by YMCA staff and tested in YMCA programs.
Food & Fun After School Second Edition was created by the Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center on Nutrition and Physical Activity in collaboration with YMCA of the USA.
Project Director: Steven Gortmaker, PhD
Project Coordinator: Rebecca Mozaffarian, MS MPH
Research Coordinator: Rebekka Lee, SM
Research Assistants: Emily Sanders SM, Analisa Andry SM, Maria Sequenzia MSEd
Food & Fun After School First Edition was created by the Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center on Nutrition and Physical Activity in collaboration with YMCA of the USA.
Project Directors: Jean Wiecha, PhD and Steven Gortmaker, PhD
Project Coordinator and Health/Nutrition Writer: Suzanne Nobrega, MS
Research Associate: Toben Nelson, MS ScD
Curriculum Developer: Lori P Marcotte, MPH, MS, RD
Recipe Developer: Julia Grimali, MLA
Out of School Nutrition and Physical Activity Initiative (OSNAP)
The Out of School Nutrition and Physical Activity Initiative (OSNAP), works with out of school time (OST) programs in Massachusetts and Maine to improve nutrition- and physical activity-related practices, environments, and policies.
With our community partners, OSNAP helps identify and support sustainable policy and environmental strategies that promote increased access to healthy snacks and opportunities for physical activity that can be used in a variety of OST settings.
For more resources and information, visit The Out of School Time Nutrition and Physical Activity Initiative at OSNAP.org
The OSNAP initiative is supported by the Prevention Research Center cooperative agreement number 5U48DP001946 from the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center
The mission of the Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center is to work with communities, community agencies, state and local government, and other partners to develop, implement, and evaluate methodologies and interventions to improve nutrition and physical activity and reduce overweight and chronic disease risk among children, youth, and their families and to reduce and eliminate disparities in these outcomes.
The Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center is supported by a cooperative agreement with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (5U48DP001946; original work supported by U48/DP00064)