Development and field testing of nutrition education for Latinos: The Spanish Versions of the Plate Method and Food Label Lessons

The CDC funded REACH Detroit Partnership and NIH-funded Healthy Mothers on the Move (Healthy MOMs) are community-based participatory research interventions that aim to eliminate diabetes disparities among African American and Latinos. REACH steering committee members, trained community family health advocates (FHA) and participants recommended changes to the diabetes prevention curriculum's content and structure. A series of new lessons on nutrition that integrated principles of instructional psychology and active learning were field tested with FHAs and participants. The results of the piloted lessons: Plate Method (American Diabetes Association) and Nutrition Food Label (Food and Drug Administration) suggested the new format was satisfactory and identified problems with the amount of reading, supplemental materials, length of the lesson, complexity of the food label, and tailoring the food to Latino participants. Lessons were further improved by developing additional content in Spanish and piloted with postpartum Latina women enrolled in Healthy Moms. This presentation will discuss the evaluation of the pilot with Latina women, share the completed lessons and highlight how principles of instructional psychology were used to strengthen the nutrition component. We conclude that the structure of the lessons can improve satisfaction of program participants. Principles of instructional psychology can improve both the delivery and understanding of complex information. Simplifying nutrition information, cultural and linguistic tailoring and addition of fun hands-on activities promote ownership learning, which can be essential in reducing health disparities associated with diabetes.