A Diagnostic Study About Healthy Lifestyle Habits in Elementary School Students

Abstract

Healthy lifestyle promotion has been an important issue during the last years in response of the high rates of overweight and obesity in the children population in our country. However, after more than 10 years of implementing different strategies against this health problems, the results show that effects are quite poor. This is the main reason why schools have become the central focus in the promotion of healthy lifestyles, because experts found that schools should be transformed into communities for social promotion: spaces where inclusive education models that gives inner resources to their students by promoting actions and implementing policies that eliminate all the obstacles in the full development of children are adopted, such as health and hygiene conditions or unhealthy lifestyle habits because of the sociocultural context. The objective of the study was to make a diagnosis that reveals the inclusive practices that are carried out in a school environment in terms of healthy lifestyle. It was made in a public elementary school located in the outskirts of the city of Durango, Durango, México. The method used in the diagnosis was qualitative with a phenomenological observational type. The results show that students are socially excluded and vulnerable as a result of the poverty conditions they have to deal, and that’s the reason why is important to improve the lifestyle habits, hygiene and health conditions in order to get close to their well-being and can get a better development of their human potential. This diagnosis provided enough elements for develop an intervention process with an action-research orientation guided by educational psychology bases, which is still in phase of implementation in the school community.