UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Teachers and parents looking to help students avoid youth obesity and bad nutrition can access a new resource developed by Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences.

"Nutrition Mission" is an educational CD-ROM designed to educate students about wise snack and fast food choices and about the importance of daily physical activity. Suitable for classroom or home use, the CD creates a rich learning environment using graphics, sound, video and animation to make learning about nutrition fun.

Katherine Cason, who developed the software's concept while an associate professor of food science at Penn State, says Nutrition Mission was created to help youth improve eating behaviors by providing information that focuses on their issues and identified needs.

"We include lessons on using the food guide pyramid, reading labels, understanding nutrient density, maximizing physical activity and much more," Cason says. "Fun games such as Snack Rater, Food Analyzer and Pyramid Power help kids explore healthy eating and physical activity." Teachers can use "Nutrition Mission" and its accompanying Web site to expand their resources, heighten learning in the classroom and enrich units of study in health and physical fitness, mathematics, science, technology and language arts. The program also can be used as a stand-alone unit of study.

The software was developed with support from the U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Stamp Nutrition Education Program, the Pennsylvania Nutrition Education Network, Penn State's Department of Food Science, Penn State Nutrition Links and Penn State Cooperative Extension. Cason, who now teaches at Clemson University, worked with Interactive Design and Development Inc. of Blacksburg, Va., to produce the software.

Minimum system requirements for the CD-ROM are Pentium II 300 MHz with 64 MB RAM; Windows 98, NT 4.0 (Service Pack 3 or higher), 2000, ME or XP; 32-bit sound card; and a 12x CD-ROM reader. Internet access is recommended.

Copies of "Nutrition Mission" are available for $30 each (plus $5 for U.S. shipping and handling) from the College of Agricultural Sciences Publications Distribution Center. For ordering information, call 814-865-6713 or visit the college's publications Web site at http://pubs.cas.psu.edu. To order using MasterCard or Visa, call (877) 345-0691 toll-free.

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EDITORS: Contact Katherine Cason at 814-865-9288 or by e-mail at klc13@psu.edu.

Contact:

Gary Abdullah jjm29@psu.edu 814-863-2708 814-863-9877 fax #283