Welcome. My name is [NAME] and I am leading the Food Explorers: Family Edition project; this is [BLANK] our research assistant. Thank you for agreeing to share your thoughts and opinions about nutrition, food, child health, communication technologies, and how schools and families can work together to improve child heath. You were invited to participate because you are a student in the 5th grade at Henderson Collegiate. Your ideas will help us build a program that helps families just like yours raise healthy kids using fun and easy digital communication tools. Today I will ask some questions, and you will share your thoughts and opinions. Remember, there are no right or wrong answers, and whatever you share today is confidential and you and your fellow participants agree not to share what was discussed here outside this room. [BLANK] will take notes in case the recording doesn’t work, but [SHE/HE] won’t write down any names or identifying information. At the end of the hour, you will receive [STICKERS/STAMPS/ETC] for participating in our focus group session. Please help yourself to light refreshments and drinks at any time during this session.
I first need to review the assent forms in front of you; you must sign the assent form to participate and your parents had to have signed the consent form, but you do not have to participate if you do not want to. There are no penalties if you choose not to participate today. [FG ASSENT PROCESS] [COLLECT PARENT CONSENT FORMS IF NOT DONE SO ALREADY]
WRITTEN DEMOGRAPHIC SURVEY
DEMOGRAPHICS 1. Age: ___
2. Race: White, Black, Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American, Mixed, Other, Prefer Not to Say
3. Ethnicity: Hispanic Y/N, Prefer Not to Say 4. Gender: Female/Male/Prefer Not to Say 5. Grade: _____
Any questions? Let’s begin.
6. As a warm up, let’s start by going around and sharing one of our favorite foods . Community Context
7. One the card in front of you, jot down a few words that describe a healthy kid. Let’s share a few ideas.
8. What are some of the barriers to you eating well? d. What helps you eat well?
Preferred Message Sources
10. Who do you trust to give you accurate information about healthy eating and nutrition? Tell me more about that.
e. Prompts (if needed): doctor, nutritionist, family, friend, school, student, government (state or federal), TV personalities, celebrities, journalists, etc. 11. Thinking about school food for a second: what are the “lunch ladies” (and “lunch guys”!)
responsibilities each day?
f. How much do you think school nutrition staff (“the lunch ladies”) know about healthy eating and nutrition? Please explain.
g. How much do you think school nutrition managers/directors know about healthy eating and nutrition? Please explain.
h. How much do you think the director of North Carolina’s School Nutrition Programs knows about healthy eating and nutrition? Please explain. “Alright. We’re going to switch gears for a moment and talk about technology.” Communication Channels
12. How many of your parents own a mobile phone? [Hands - count]
e. How many of your parents own a Smartphone that connects to the internet? [Hands - count]
13. How many of your parents use social media sites (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.)? [Hands - count]
14. Whether your family owns a mobile phone/engage with social media or not…
f. How do you prefer to communicate with family/friends/the school (e.g. in person, phone, email, text, social media, other)? Please explain.
Healthy Eating and Family
14. What does it mean to be a “good eater”?
15. What are the most stressful meal times for you, and why?
16. Please describe the nutrition/healthy eating questions you would like to ask “the experts” and get real answers about.
a. To help us later on, please write one question down on your notecard for us to use later.
[SHOW FE SIGNAGE, STAMPS, TATTOOS, PASSPORT AND TRADING CARD EXAMPLES; SHOW TEXT MESSAGE AND SOCIAL MEDIA EXAMPLES]
“The new project launching in September for families is an extension of an earlier project we conducted in elementary schools. That project, called Food Explorers, had three parts: (1) create new kid-friendly vegetable and fruit recipes and train the cafeteria staff to make those new recipes; (2) put up lots of fun signage [see examples] on the line and in the cafeteria to promote these new items; (3) a passport and trading card game for students to complete in class – if they tried 12 new foods, and got stamps to prove it, and collected the right trading cards [see examples] they could become Master Explorers and get their name, certificate, and picture up in the cafeteria under the Food Explorers banner PLUS celebrate with our team and the cafeteria staff with a frozen yogurt party at the end of the year. The primary mission of that project was to get kids to eat more fruits and vegetables at lunch.”
“I’ll stop there for your reactions to the original project.”
17. What are your initial reactions to this first project? What do you like about the design/the program? What do you not like about the design/the program?
“Now remember your questions for the ‘experts’ about healthy eating earlier? The new piece of the program we would like to add is this: in addition to all the fun activities at school, we’re proposing a FAMILY COMPONENT including a text message program that sends information to your parent, up to once per day, with information, tips, links to video clips, etc. that help you answer some of these healthy eating questions and help your family eat well. We’d ask your parent to share the information with you from their phone.
There would also be a social media site where your family could ask questions of the ‘experts’, post pictures and phrases in response to challenges sent by text (e.g. “Share a picture of your family eating their favorite vegetable”), compete for small prizes each week by answering quiz questions about information shared by text that week, and get support from other families who understand exactly where you’re coming from.
The text message and social media program would be managed by school food experts, perhaps someday at the district or state level.”
“I’ll stop there for your reactions to the family addition to the original Food Explorer project.” 18. What are your initial reactions to this piece? What do you like about the design of the
family component? What do you not like about the proposed family component?
d. Probes: frequency of text messages; content of text messages; accessing/using social media for healthy eating support; specific ‘expert’ behind the program; the idea of such a program coming from school food staff (at any level); incentives to participate; if phones and internet aren’t feasible delivery modes, alternatives; reaction to sharing information on mobile phones with family?
ADDITIONAL QUESTION: How can school nutrition staff support families to raise healthy children?
APPENDIX 2.5: PARENT SURVEY (PRE/POST)