Kids spoke up, and stood up, at Michelle Obama's town hall meeting. Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson.

RODALE NEWS, EMMAUS, PA—"Kids talking to kids is better than adults talking to kids,” said 17-year-old Angelika Chickara, who was sitting in the elegant State Dining Room at the White House yesterday with 75 middle- and high-school students for a live televised Let’s Move! Town Hall meeting. In conjunction with C-SPAN in the Classroom, as well as the 30,000 schools that are part of that program across the country, Chickara participated in a Q&A with First Lady Michelle Obama yesterday.

It was the first time Mrs. Obama talked at length with kids, instead of their elders, about her antiobesity campaign. Along with comments and questions from the students in attendance at the White House, additional children dialed in from their classrooms with questions.

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THE DETAILS: What the first lady said is not so different from what she has told everyone else over the last year about exercise, eating, and staying at a healthy weight. So it’s not what Mrs. Obama said that was newsworthy: This time around, it’s what the children had to say that makes the news. Most of those present represented the two-thirds of children who are not overweight or obese, and many of them seemed to have a pretty good sense of what they should do to stay that way. But that didn’t stop one little voice from popping up before the program began, asking, “What’s obesity?” (Maybe he was a plant.)

So what did the kids have to say? I spoke with some after the meeting, and there were some revealing moments. Children, of course, are very good at parroting back what adults have told them, and these certainly got the first lady’s message.

“We all have to be in this together,” said one child.

“It’s important to get exercise, and it can be just playing outside,” said another, who has decided that she would go out and play with her brother, “something we haven’t done in a while. It takes us to set examples for our neighborhood.”

Another one agreed that “moderation in eating candy and stuff is OK.” Another said she was going to eat more healthy food, and learn more about obesity. “If you are obese it’s hard to move around,” she said. “I will try to eat more fruits and vegetables, and have cake occasionally for dessert, so I don’t gain a lot of weight.”

WHAT IT MEANS: We don’t often hear it, but childhood obesity won't be eliminated without the participation of the children themselves. And, perhaps, without actually hearing what they have to say about it. Three children who were standing together when I approached them turned out to be youth advisory board members for the Alliance for a Healthier Generation, the partnership between the American Heart Association and the Clinton Foundation. Angelika Chickara was one of them.

"About two years ago I was overweight,” she said. "Through healthy eating and exercise, I lost a ton of weight." Asked why she did it, she said: “I knew that otherwise, health issues were coming. You know it when you go running and you can’t breathe.”