Best Practice

Obesity – what can primary schools do?

Pastoral issues PSHE PE and sport Pupil wellbeing
Recent figures show a sharp rise in obesity among year 6 pupils. While this is a challenge for all of society, what steps can primary schools take to tackle childhood obesity? Tiffnie Harris advises


Back in November, the NHS released some shocking statistics on obesity among children in reception and year 6 (NHS, 2021).

They revealed that the prevalence of obesity in reception had increased from 9.9% in 2019/20 to 14.4% in 2020/21, and from 21% to 25.5% in year 6 over the same period. It hardly needs saying that the fact that a quarter of 10 and 11-year-olds are categorised as being obese represents a significant health problem.

Of course, there are lots of factors involved in this issue – many of which lie outside the school gate.

As pointed out in an Ofsted report and blog in 2018 – which I will come back to shortly – families, government, industry and other parts of the public sector all have a role to play in making food and drink healthier and in supporting children to make better choices.

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