One Sydney high school teacher became so alarmed about the problem at his school that he asked a local doctors' group to help him devise a program to deal with it, with dramatic results.

In just one year, the number of children participating in sport has increased, they are eating healthier food, and the school's sporting performance overall has improved.

Now other schools are about to take on the same challenge.

Teacher Mark Long is the head of physical education at Elizabeth Macarthur High in Sydney's south.

During his five years at the school, he noticed a disturbing trend: that year seven students were getting fatter every year, and simultaneously their sporting skills were taking a dive.

"They were changed in body shapes and there was also a decrease in the amount of physical activity that students in our school were undertaking," he said.

"There were some significant body changes that were taking place."

New program

Unsure of just how to tackle the problem, Mr Long contacted the area's local division of GPs.

Together, they devised the "Eat it, Work it, Move it" program.

The first part of the pilot project involved offering the students more opportunities to exercise, and Mr Long says they jumped at it.

"In the summer months we did a before-school swimming program where students - at times 30 or 40 students - would arrive at school at 7.30am at our local pool, and undertake swimming training," he said.

"Then as the year progressed, we had a running program as well, where often in the morning at 7.30am we'd have up to 70 or 80 students attending school to participate in the running program, working with coaches and the PE staff."

Mr Long says staff were "absolutely rapt" with the turnout.

Teachers join in

The program was not limited to just students, 22 teachers also putting their runners on, starting a pedometer challenge to see how far they could walk in a week.

But an important part of the overall 12-month project involved changing the eating habits of students and teachers.

Christine Wirtz is a dietitian and exercise physiologist at the Macarthur Division of General Practitioners.

She surveyed the students first, before suggesting an overhaul of the school canteen.

"We looked at giving them options such as healthy sandwiches for lunch, wraps, chicken burgers, those sorts of things, to stop selling full sugar soft drinks and potato chips, and giving healthier snack options for them," she said.

She said there was some initial resistance.

"Definitely, from the canteen staff, there was initial resistance because that was how they ran the canteen and I think profits as well would be affected initially by making that change," she said.

Cultural change

Mr Long says it is hard to believe the school achieved such a huge cultural change in just 12 months.

"We've seen an increase of 15 per cent of students participating in sport three or more times a week, which is a really powerful figure," he said.

"In an eating sense, we've also seen a 12 per cent increase of kids eating fruit and vegetable on a daily basis and an 89 per cent increase of students limiting their takeaway consumption to one day a week, which is a really powerful data."

Competitively, those changes helped the school lift its performance at inter-school competitions.

"The three major carnivals that we participate in are the swimming, the cross-country and our athletics carnival," Mr Long said.

"Traditionally, Elizabeth Macarthur High School would normally place sixth or seventh in our local zone and we're now a top three achiever across the zone in those three major sports."

He says he is really proud of what has been achieved.

"I'm proud of myself, but I'm also really proud of our staff," he said.

"Because all of our staff on our PE faculty have been really committed to the program, and now because of leadership of our whole faculty, our whole teaching staff and all of the students and their parents, they're now really engaged in the program as well.

"So it's had a really significant cultural change." © 2007 Australian Broadcasting Corporation