POSITIVELY AGINING: OPTIMIZING MOBILITY ACROSS LIFE

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This SEPA application is a Phase I and II application to create, evaluate, and disseminate new teaching materials centered on the inter-related areas of mobility and obesity for the Positively Aging program. The National Institute on Aging (NIA) and the Surgeon General's Office have underscored the importance of physical activity and health maintenance across the life span. This application will utilize information from patient-oriented clinical research related to mobility and obesity as examples to create lessons and activities that effectively teach scientific and mathematical principles dealing with forces and motion at the middle school level. The Positively Aging program is an active ten-year innovative interdisciplinary partnership between the working scientists of the Aging Research and Education Center (AREC) of the UTHSCSA and middle school educators in San Antonio, TX. The Positively Aging program has three long-term goals: 1. to provide innovative, effective teaching materials that center on math and science curricular elements and are based on examples from the Gerontologic Sciences; 2. to help students learn to make critical, life determining decisions for extending and enhancing their own lives; and 3. to help students develop a sensitivity to the needs and concerns of the aging population. For the present application, we designed three specific aims to achieve these long-range goals: 1. To create new instructional materials focused on mobility and obesity that teach students: (A) Scientific and mathematical concepts of forces and motion; B) The associations between mobility, obesity, disease, and disability across the life span; (C) Activities that promote healthy nutritional and activity habits across the life span. 2. To develop a cohesive set of quantitative evaluation strategies to determine whether the new Positively Aging instructional program improve: (A) Knowledge and skills specific to State of Texas and National Standards for math and science curricular objectives; B) Knowledge specific to the associations between mobility, obesity, disease, and disability; (C) Knowledge and skills regarding healthy nutrition and activity habits. 3. To disseminate the new materials through the internet and teacher workshops.