# data[].attributes.body
This article on Mental and Emotional Health from PBS touches on the nations student population showing an increase in mental health concerns. Mental health concerns are rapidly growing especially after the COVID-19 pandemic resulting in an unfortunate spike of suicides in students. The article also touches on new plans in place to better respond to growing mental health needs. This can be addressed in the classroom with the addition of adequate resources provided to the students. Teachers can help by providing a safe place for students to feel comfortable speaking about their feelings and by providing additional help and resources where needed.

Potter, S. (2024, January 16). Student-led network helps address shortage of mental health professionals in schools. PBS. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/student-led-network-helps-address-shortage-of-mental-health-professionals-in-schools

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Mental health among the nation's student population has been a growing concern, especially due to the pandemic. From PBS Wisconsin, Steven Potter reports on how peer support, school staff and psychology researchers are trying to keep up with the growing rate of mental health issues among students. It's part of our series, Early Warnings: America's Youth Mental Health Crisis.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Student-led network helps address shortage of mental health professionals in schools

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Mental health among the nation's student population has been a growing concern, especially due to the pandemic. From PBS Wisconsin, Steven Potter reports on how peer support, school staff and psychology researchers are trying to keep up with the growing rate of mental health issues among students.

# data[].attributes.body
This article on Healthy eating from ABC describes how the company Lunchables announced they are preparing to provide ready to eat lunchable meals to students by putting them in school cafeterias all over. There has been changes made with improved nutrition that complies with the National School Lunch Program requirements. This change reduced added sugars and sodium greatly over several school years. This pertains to teaching health because not only does this directly correlate to the students, but it allows teachers to address the importance of healthy eating. Teachers can discuss sodium and sugars within eating meals. This is important for teachers to know, because students, especially in the school, need to have healthy and nutritious meals in order to stay concentrated and ready to learn. Knowing the standards for students school lunches can help in the long run.

Kavilanz, P. (2023, March 15). Lunchables to begin serving meals in school cafeterias as part of New Government Program. 6abc Philadelphia. https://6abc.com/lunchables-government-program-school-cafeterias-healthy/12951091/

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Lunchables to begin serving meals in school cafeterias as part of new government program

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Lunchables will begin serving students meals in school cafeterias as part of new government program.

# data[].attributes.body
This article on Grief and loss from CBS News, describes a unique way of approaching grief and loss after dealing with several unexpected deaths over the past few months. Valentine and Floy created a summer grief camp for children to not be afraid to talk about these things. Whether children are going through a death or even a divorce, every child has a story. The camp makes sure to use real language to the children and support the kids by walking through their pain rather than pushing it aside. This can be addressed in the whole school, not only the classroom with whole grade assemblies and by fostering a welcoming environment to make sure students feel comfortable and safe enough to talk about these difficult things. Teachers can have one on one check ins with each student to build a relationship with them. Teachers can also ask the guidance counselor to come in for a brief talk to the class, or even host a meeting with children during lunch to talk about problems in a safe place.

Littlefield, S.-E. (2024, August 25). Owatonna hosts summer camp to help children deal with grief. CBS News. https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/owatonna-grief-camp/?intcid=CNM-00-10abd1h

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Owatonna hosts summer camp to help children deal with grief

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
One southern Minnesota town is approaching grief and loss in a unique way.

# data[].attributes.body
This article on personal wellness from CBS News talks about a studio where they empower women through healing and self care. It is proved that yoga, meditation and sound bath classes are just few of many ways to combat trauma, stress and anxiety. There are many classes to choose from at this studio that helps women deal with the hard balance of everything on their plate and is proven to work. This can be addressed in the classroom in many ways. During a morning meeting, there can be time for a mindful minute which can include yoga poses or meditation for the students to begin their day with. This can be essential for teachers to know because something so quick and seemingly so simple, can drastically change the behaviors of many students in your classroom because of their calming start to their school day.

Zizaza, N. (2024, March 22). This Baltimore Wellness Studio is empowering women through healing and self-care. CBS News. https://www.cbsnews.com/baltimore/news/this-baltimore-wellness-studio-is-empowering-women-through-healing-and-self-care/?intcid=CNM-00-10abd1h

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
This Baltimore wellness studio is empowering women through healing and self-care

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
At Get Centered Wellness, Dr. Michelle Perry says yoga, meditation, and sound bath classes are just a few tools used to combat trauma, stress, and anxiety.

# data[].attributes.body
This article on intentional injury and violence  from NPR describes the implementation of multiple different safety and mental health resources for schools affected by gun violence. Firearms contributed to the deaths of children and teens more than any injury or illness. Causing stress, anxiety, depression, trauma, many educators believe their sole responsibility at all times is to make sure students feel safe and can let their guard down. This is a fairly difficult topic to address in the classroom because of how real and raw these events are but needs to be done. Teachers can address ways to stay safe, precautions and procedures and mainly make sure students know they are safe. This is essential for teachers to know because, how awful it is to say, this is a lot of peoples reality on a random tuesday and not only do the teachers need to know how to handle the situation, so do our students.

NPR. (2024, April 19). Where gun violence is common, some students say physical safety is a top concern. NPR. https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1243881326

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The students at North Community High School in Minneapolis have seen a lot. Some things, morbid curiosities: a bullet, freshly fired, spinning and melting the rubber on the track surrounding the school's football field.

Others, much more painful: the murder of Deshaun Hill Jr., shot and killed two years ago just blocks from the school. He was 15 years old, and the quarterback of the football team.

"That was my best friend, so we did everything with each other. I feel like that's the toughest thing, just knowing that he's not physically by my side anymore," senior Kahlil Brown says.

Last spring, another member of the football team was shot in both legs. He survived.

"It is not normal. It shouldn't be seen as normal. But we go through it so much that it is normal here," senior Jalen Beard says.

Across the country, millions of young people are enduring this same reality: Firearm injuries are the leading cause of death for children and teens over age 1 nationwide.

The federal government is investing billions of dollars to combat this problem. But on the north side of Minneapolis, some students living under the threat of gun violence say there's a disconnect between what the government is offering and what they say they need.

"We needed that police officer at our school and they took it out"

Gun violence affects children and teenagers in devastating ways, says Sonali Rajan, an associate professor at Columbia University's Teachers College. That goes far beyond the physical harm guns can cause.

"Witnessing firearm violence, surviving a shooting, hearing gunshots," Rajan says. "There's a real range of experiences that we have to consider when we think about its impacts and the emotional trauma that goes hand-in-hand with that - nightmares, anxiety, difficulty concentrating, typical symptoms we might associate with post-traumatic stress disorder."

Students exposed to gun violence are less likely to do well in school and less likely to graduate. What's more, the rate of firearm deaths for Black children is six times higher than it is for white children. In Minneapolis, students at North High are well aware of those effects.

"If you're outside, you don't really feel comfortable, you don't really get to relax," Beard says. "Even if you're not the one doing it, even if you're not a part of no gang, nothing like that. But you could still end up being the one on the ground."

In response, the Biden administration is awarding $1 billion across the next several years as part of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. That money aims to increase the number of mental health professionals in schools.

As part of the same legislation, the administration distributed about another $1 billion in grants to create what it calls "safer and healthier learning environments," employing a wide range of strategies - including anti-bullying and violence prevention programs, staff training and metal detectors.

Minneapolis Public Schools will receive at least $500,000 of this federal aid, much of which is focused on drug and alcohol prevention. The district plans to apply for the mental health grants and has received other state and federal funding specifically for preventing gun violence.

When it comes to more mental health resources, Beard says he would welcome that extra support, as long as a counselor can truly relate.

"You don't want to talk to a stranger who has never been in this situation, who never had one of their best friends pass away at 15," Beard says. "They wouldn't understand. And it would feel like I'm talking to an alien, basically."

In 2020, George Floyd was murdered by a police officer in this same city. Shortly after, the school district ended its contract with the city's police - and pulled school resource officers from its buildings.

"So now the police is out of our schools," says Brown, the senior whose best friend was killed. "We needed that police officer at our school and they took it out."

The school still has a security monitor, but that person is not a sworn officer. The security monitor can't arrest people and doesn't carry a weapon. Students say they don't want to be overpoliced, much less by officers they don't know. But at North, the school resource officer was also the head coach of the football team - and still is.

"That's a trusted person," Beard says. "If I knew my coach was out there protecting me, I'm fine."

Studies have shown the presence of police can criminalize the school space and serve as a pipeline into the criminal justice system, says Rajan, the Columbia researcher. Still, she says, the need for real physical safety is valid.

"We can't necessarily employ a cookie cutter approach to gun violence prevention," Rajan says. "There are 51 million children in our public school system right now. So there is a lot of nuance here we have to contend with."

"What are we doing to prevent that violence from happening at all?"

Every morning, Principal Friestleben stations herself in the hallway to greet students. She says that's intentional: Structure and consistency communicate to students that they're safe.

"My children are walking in with generational and personal experience of not being protected and not being valued and centered," she says.

Educators need to understand that even though they can't control what happens in the neighborhood, schools can make a real difference in student well-being, says Dan Flannery, a professor who researches gun violence at Case Western Reserve University.

"If you have a positive school climate and culture, if kids feel attached to the school, they're going to have a much more positive experience," Flannery says. "You need to have a commitment to that perspective. The staff and teachers and principals have to understand that this is an important thing to do."

The all-hands-on-deck approach is part of a larger way of thinking: treating gun violence as a disease.

"Public health is predicated on the notion that we should invest as much as we can in what we call primary prevention," Rajan says. "Prevention is saying 'What are we doing years and years before an individual is posing a potential threat to a school community? What are we doing to make it harder? What are we doing to prevent that violence from happening at all?'"

She says alongside stricter gun laws, strengthening communities at large - investing not just in school culture, but also in things like affordable housing and neighborhood green space - can act as a sort of vaccine against violence.

Friestleben wants to see that investment. And though she welcomes the funds, she isn't sure the latest federal grants will get at the root problems that can lead to gun violence.

"It's no different than one of my kids being hungry and going to the corner store and getting chips. It's satisfying a teeny, tiny little bit of hunger, but not in a healthy, sustainable, longstanding way," she says.

This year Jalen Beard and Kahlil Brown will graduate and go on to college.

They'll attend St. Olaf College, a small liberal arts school about 45 miles from home. They're going to be roommates, and they'll both be playing football, something they talked about doing with their friend who's no longer here.

"He wasn't getting in trouble. He went to class. He had good grades," Beard says. "To me, he was doing everything right. He was doing everything he was supposed to be. And he still didn't get his opportunity."

Note: Meg Anderson was a teacher for Minneapolis Public Schools several years ago. Her spouse works for the district.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Where gun violence is common, some students say physical safety is a top concern

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The federal government is investing billions to bolster school safety and mental health resources to combat gun violence. But some sense a disconnect between those programs and what students need.

# data[].attributes.body
This article on Preventing Alcohol and Drug Use from NPR discuss real life experiences of teens and talks about different ways to support prevention of alcohol and drug use with students. A high school implemented a course called safety first which encourages students to abstain from drug use while providing them the most accurate information to reduce risk of addiction. The use of activities are crucial for this kind of course because lectures can only do so much. This pertains to teaching health in school because as the years go on, more and more students begin to get their hands on drugs at younger and younger ages. This is essential for teachers to understand symptoms and information on because the students are constantly in the hands of the teacher throughout the day and seeing or hearing something so little can point to signs of using drugs. Teachers can continue to learn about this topic and try and implement strategies and support systems for students.

Gaines, L. V., & Cohen, N. (2023, December 19). “just say no” didn’t actually protect students from drugs. here’s what could. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2023/11/09/1211217460/fentanyl-drug-education-dare

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
College sophomore Elias Myers thinks his friends are lucky to be alive.

The 19-year-old recounts a recent incident in which his friends got ahold of a drug that test strips showed was laced with fentanyl, a potent, often deadly, synthetic opioid.

"That's kind of when I decided that caution is not, like, a best practice, but a survival technique," says the University of California, Berkeley, student.

And yet those survival techniques were never talked about in Myers' middle and high school drug education classes. In fact Myers says they didn't mention fentanyl at all. He says those classes failed to prepare him and his peers for an increasingly dangerous drug landscape in which a single high can have deadly consequences.

Myers says everything he learned about fentanyl has been from friends and older siblings.

"But it didn't have to be that way. We could have learned safety way ahead of time," he says.

For decades, students like Myers have been told to just say no to drugs. The message was repeated in public service announcements and in classroom presentations. But research shows this approach alone doesn't work. And now, overdose deaths among teenagers have skyrocketed - largely due to fentanyl. The synthetic opioid was involved in the vast majority of teen overdose deaths in 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many of those deaths involved fentanyl-laced counterfeit prescription pills that didn't come from a pharmacy. And the problem has followed teens onto college campuses.

Some experts say drug education that focuses on harm reduction techniques - designed to keep people safe when they do choose to use - could help save lives. Here's what that looks like.

Teaching safety measures for when students do choose to use

"The most important tenet of drug education is to be honest," says professor Bonnie Halpern-Felsher. "And to have a balanced perspective. We cannot lie, we cannot exaggerate to teens."

Halpern-Felsher directs Stanford University's REACH Lab, which focuses on understanding, preventing and reducing teen and young adult substance use, among other risky behaviors.

Her lab maintains a high school curriculum called Safety First (initially developed by the nonprofit Drug Policy Alliance), which encourages young people to abstain from drug use while also providing them with information to reduce their risk of addiction and death if they or their friends do choose to use. The concept is called harm reduction.

First, Halpern-Felsher says, students need to know the facts about drugs - including their benefits and their harms.

For example, opioids like fentanyl have been used safely in healthcare facilities for decades to treat patients' pain. But when used recreationally - either purposefully or unknowingly - it's extremely dangerous, because very small amounts can lead to an overdose.

Activities - not just lectures - should be used to demonstrate a lesson, Halpern-Felsher explains. The Safety First curriculum includes an activity that asks students to add sugar to one pitcher of water and salt to another.

"You cannot see the difference. But one can and potentially will really hurt you. And this is why it's so important for you to understand that you cannot just simply pick up a drug and go ahead and use it," she says.

The curriculum also outlines safety measures for when students or their friends do choose to use drugs. Messages like:

If you're using drugs, the healthiest choice is to stop using, or at least cut down on how much and how often you use.

Ideally, you're using drugs only as recommended by a doctor or a pharmaceutical label. But if you're not, don't take a lot of any drug. Wait and see how it affects you before taking any more.

Consider your mindset before using drugs. What you're thinking and feeling before and during substance use can affect your experience.

Consider the setting. Where and with whom you're using drugs can reduce your chance of injury or death.

Check the substance before you use it. Testing a drug for things like fentanyl can reduce the risk of harm. But even test strips aren't always 100% accurate.

Don't mix drugs. The effects from combining drugs may be stronger and more unpredictable than one drug alone, and even deadly.

Know how to respond in an emergency: Spot the signs of an overdose. Call 911. Place someone on their side to prevent choking. Administer the opioid reversal medication naloxone, often sold under the brand name Narcan.

Halpern-Felsher knows some people might interpret harm reduction as encouraging teens to use drugs. But she says that's a misperception.

"The most important piece of this curriculum is not to use, but if they are using or if they're in situations where they might be using, we are just trying to keep them safe," she says.

There are few studies that focus on harm reduction drug education programs in schools, and more research is needed to evaluate their efficacy. But experts told NPR that harm reduction could help save lives at a moment when teens are dying at alarming rates.

A pilot study of the Safety First curriculum found it significantly increased high school students' knowledge of harm reduction techniques and behaviors, and found a decrease in overall substance use.

What harm reduction looks like in the classroom

Last spring, Cameron McNeely stood in front of a group of high schoolers and told them they had a choice to make: will they or won't they use drugs.

"I'm not here to judge you for that," he told the Indianapolis teens. "But hopefully I can present you some information that gets you to understand the consequences of those choices - yes or no - a little bit better, and, hopefully, to get you to steer clear of substance use."

McNeely, 28, is the director of youth education for Overdose Lifeline, an Indianapolis-based nonprofit that created a drug education program, with an emphasis on opioids, for students in grades six through 12.

In this presentation at Perry Meridian High School, McNeely shared statistics on drug-related deaths, explained how opioids affect the body, emphasized addiction is a disease - not a moral failing - and explained why it's a good idea to carry naloxone.

To hammer that point home, McNeely shared a personal story: One night, while in college, he and his friend took some pills to relax. Shortly after, he noticed his friend had fallen asleep, and it looked like he was struggling to breathe.

"Little did I know, about five feet away from me, my friend was having an overdose," McNeely told the students. He called 911 and emergency responders were able to revive his friend with Narcan.

"It saved his life," he said. "Narcan buys time, which is the most important thing to have in an overdose."

After the presentation, McNeely told NPR he had little to no drug education in high school.

"Nobody ever told me about how to drink safely and how, if I use pills, you know, they have different effects on you and what those effects are, and how it could just kill you - just one night, bad pill, it could all go down the drain."

McNeely's experience isn't uncommon. Drug education across the country is ad-hoc, often outdated or not provided at all. In a 2021 National Survey of Drug Use and Health, only about 60% of 12-17-year-olds self-reported that they saw or heard drug or alcohol prevention messaging in school. And there's no way to track what type of drug education programming is being offered in schools nationwide.

"I just wanted to fill in those gaps that I felt as I was growing up in my drug education," McNeely said.

The "just say no" messaging of the past didn't work

McNeely's presentation is a far cry from the drug education of prior decades - like the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program, commonly known by the acronym D.A.R.E. Launched in 1983, D.A.R.E. was taught by police officers in classrooms nationwide. Their presentations warned students about the dangers of substance use and told kids to say no to drugs. It was a message that was repeated in PSAs and cheesy songs. Former First Lady Nancy Reagan even made it one of her major causes.

Teaching drug abstinence remains popular among some groups, and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's messaging to teenagers still focuses on the goal that they should be "drug-free." But numerous studies published in the 1990s and early 2000s concluded programs like D.A.R.E. had no significant impact on drug use. And one study actually found a slight uptick in drug use among suburban students after participation in D.A.R.E. In 2009, D.A.R.E. rebranded with new curriculums for students dubbed "keepin' it REAL." But the programming doesn't focus on how students can minimize their risk of harm if they do choose to use drugs.

"It is clear that just saying no is not sufficient," says Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. "We'd like the theoretical perfect: don't touch a drug - abstinence. But that's not necessarily the reality for everyone."

Volkow says the failures of past drug education programs haunt current efforts to inform young people of the risks of fentanyl.

For years, anti-drug curriculums exaggerated the effects of certain types of substance use, she says. For example: Students were taught that using cannabis would destroy their brain or make them dumb. And while there is data to suggest cannabis use can have detrimental effects - particularly for young people - that messaging didn't always match students' lived experiences.

College sophomore Elias Myers remembers the dire warnings. But he also had classmates who used the drug.

"I couldn't understand, like, if these people can smoke weed after class and be totally fine, how can this curriculum be true?" Myers says. "I remember coming away from that in like middle school and early high school feeling really unsatisfied with the education. I remember feeling as though what I was being told perhaps wasn't the truth."

Volkow says that loss of credibility makes it harder to give students life-saving information about drugs now.

"It has weakened our position because a lot of people know others that take marijuana and they are functioning and they don't see any evidence of ill effects," she says.

And now the consequences of drug use are deadlier than ever. Teens are dying after taking what they thought was Adderall or Percocet, but turn out to be fentanyl-laced counterfeit pills.

"They actually taught us when we were children: If you cry wolf too many times, when the wolf really comes, no one is paying attention," Volkow says. "And this is, I fear, where we are a little bit with fentanyl, because it is such a dangerous moment in the history of illicit drugs right now."

Meet young people where they are, not where you want them to be

Volkow and Bonnie Halpern-Felsher say school curriculums that teach kids how to reduce the harms related to drug use can help save lives - but they're not a cure-all.

Halpern-Felsher says schools alone can't solve the fentanyl crisis; rather, it requires a cultural shift. Educators, families and communities at large need to start having honest conversations about drug use.

"And until we do, you know, just having a 50-minute class on fentanyl is not going to be the sole defining moment for anybody."

Myers, in California, serves on the Youth Action Board for Halpern-Felsher's REACH Lab, and he's familiar with the Safety First curriculum.

"I think it's realistic," Myers says of the program. "You've got to meet children and teens and youths where they are, rather than meeting them where you want them to be."

Myers says he wishes he and his peers had had access to drug curriculums like this when he was in high school.

"I think that we would have adopted ideas of safety through school and not through having to actually experience times of danger," Myers says.

"I think that we were very lucky in so many different ways... You hear often about those who don't experience that luck. And I feel like those lives could have been saved."
Edited by Nicole Cohen
Visual design and development by LA Johnson
Audio story produced by Janet Woojeong Lee

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'Just say no' didn't actually protect students from drugs. Here's what could

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
For years, programs like D.A.R.E. told students to "just say no" to drugs. But research shows that approach alone didn't work. Now experts are backing a new approach that could help save lives.

# data[].attributes.body
In this article on Trauma from NPR describes how two sisters find different ways to deal with their childhood trauma. The two sisters unfortunately dealt with experiencing being sexually assaulted by the same perpetrator. They both remember very different things and bits and pieces of what happened, which is normal since there is a lot to unpack. They both got an opportunity to coreograph a full length dance, so they took that chance to play around with how memory can twist and morph and expressed their trauma through dance. This topic is a very tough topic to address in the classroom but it needs to be done so students can understand how to deal with trauma and what to do if they experience something along the lines. This pertains to teaching health because trauma affects your mental and physical health and can change the structure of ones brain. It is essential for teachers to know this information so they are better equipped for how to handle students who are experiencing trauma, what to do when a student tells you about something, and explaining to students what the affects are of trauma. Teachers can provide many resources to students, parents and colleagues while making sure they are providing a safe space for students to feel comfortable to speak up.

Spitzer, G. (2024, April 3). After childhood trauma, sisters use art and science to explore how memory can morph. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2024/04/03/1242642114/after-childhood-trauma-sisters-use-art-and-science-to-explore-how-memory-can-mor

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
After childhood trauma, sisters use art and science to explore how memory can morph

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Two sisters struggled to remember troubling childhood events until adulthood. A neuroscientist and author gave them the science and the language to turn their work into a dance performance and a book.

# data[].attributes.body
In this article about Physical activity from CBS News explains how even the slightest movement can help improve your mental function and memory. The article shows how with lifelong physical activity, even just once a week, is associated with the best cognitive results. This include verbal memory, processing speed, higher cognition and more. Physical activity pertains to teaching health because when one is active, there are so many benefits. This topic can be addressed in a classroom by addressing ways to be active, benefits of being active and some issues that can come if you do not stay active. In the general classroom, teachers can introduce brain breaks that get students moving. This not only helps get the jitters out of the students, but also keeps their brain awake!

CBS Interactive. (n.d.). Get moving, any physical activity improves brain function, study found. CBS News. https://www.cbsnews.com/miami/news/get-moving-any-physical-activity-improves-brain-function-study-found/?intcid=CNM-00-10abd1h

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
/ CBS/CNN

MIAMI - Get moving.

Any exercise, even as little as once a month, can help preserve mental function and memory.

A major study in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry showed a link between exercise and lower risks of dementia and cognitive decline. While even a little exercise can help, people who exercised regularly throughout adulthood saw the most benefit.

The study tracked the physical activity patterns of nearly 1,500 people over the course of 30 years in adulthood. At age 69, the participants were tested on their cognitive state, verbal memory and processing speed.

While lifelong physical activity was associated with the best cognitive results later in life, being active at any time to any extent was associated with higher cognition, the study found.

Even people who became active in their 50s or 60s achieved better cognitive scores when they reached 70 years old, said study author Dr. Sarah-Naomi James, a research fellow at MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing at University College London. A surprisingly small amount of activity - as little as once a month - at any time across adulthood was helpful, she added.

"It seems clear from this study and others that small doses of exercise across the lifespan and starting young is very beneficial to long term health," said Dr. William Roberts, professor of family medicine and community health at the University of Minnesota Medical School, via email.

Roberts was not involved in the research.

On a societal level, the findings show a need for more access to education that encourages skills and motivation for physical activity at any age, according to the study.

How to get active
For people who have been active regularly, the results should be encouraging and suggest that their investment can pay off, Roberts said.

"For people who have never been physically active, or have gone through a period of inactivity, start!" James said via email.

If you are not exactly an athlete who loves to break a sweat, there are still ways to work some activity into your life.

To build a habit that sticks, it is important to set a goal, make a specific plan, find a way to make it fun, stay flexible and get social support, said behavioral scientist Katy Milkman, author of "How to Change: The Science of Getting from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be". Milkman is the James G. Dinan Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

You can start slow, said Dana Santas, CNN fitness contributor and mind-body coach for professional athletes.

"Fitting in 10 minutes of exercise every day is so much easier than people think. Consider how fast 10 minutes goes by when you're mindlessly scrolling social media or watching your favorite TV show," said Santas. "It's not a big-time investment, but it can deliver big health benefits."

Yoga is a great way to be active while relieving stress - and is easily accessible for all levels online, she said.

And walking outside or on a treadmill is one of the simplest ways to bring exercise in consistently, Santas said.

"Walking is the most underrated, corrective, mind-body, fat-burning exercise available to humans," she added. "I walk every single day."

Regular walks can be a great opportunity to multitask if you use them to bond with family, friends, and neighbors, Santas added.

If you want to boost the intensity of your walk, Santas recommended adding in harder intervals, weights, or a heavy backpack.

"Walking for five minutes every hour goes a long way," said Evan Matthews, associate professor of exercise science and physical education at New Jersey's Montclair State University. "It doesn't need to even be moderate intensity. Just move."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Get moving, any physical activity improves brain function, study found

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Any exercise, even as little as once a month, can help preserve mental function and memory