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The students of class CM2 at the St. Joan of Arc elementary school are playing with their food — and their teacher is delighted. The kids, 11- and 12-year-olds from the town of Laventie in northern France, finger fleshy chunks of mango with fascination and wince as they suck on lime slices. During the course of the morning, the class learns that fruits contain minerals, fiber, sugar and vitamins. "Who knows why we need vitamin C?" asks Carole de Bailleul, a nutritionist employed by the local school district. Three hands shoot up. "Without it we become tired," answers Margo Demarey, with gleeful enthusiasm.

If only more of Europe's children knew as much about healthy food. Just like their counterparts in the U.S., European kids increasingly feast on a diet high in fat and sugar and low in nutrition — and too often that includes what their schools feed them. The junk-food problem was highlighted recently by British television chef Jamie Oliver, who describes meals served in British schools as "mostly rubbish." Poor diets have fuelled a big increase in the number of obese children; levels of childhood obesity in Europe have increased from between 5% and 10% 25 years ago to as much as 25% in some countries today. It may also contribute to bad behavior and learning difficulties. A study by Oxford University's department of physiology published in this month's issue of the U.S. journal Pediatrics found that underachieving British children's reading and spelling abilities were dramatically improved when their diets were supplemented with fish oils containing omega-3 fatty acids — essential for brain development but missing from modern processed foods.

Schools and parents are finally waking up to the notion that poor diet is making kids fatter, angrier and less able to learn. The health-and-nutrition class at St. Joan of Arc, for instance, is part of a government-sponsored effort to tackle child obesity. Funded by European food and drug companies and France's Ministry of Health, the program is designed to make healthy eating part of children's everyday lives — at school and at home.

Nutritionists teach children from the age of 3 what, and how much, they should eat, and also train other teachers who can then incorporate the healthy-eating mantra into their classes. School lunches now replace unhealthy foods like French fries with vegetables such as beans. Children in the district also dig into a healthy preschool breakfast buffet intended to supplement the breakfast they ate — or sometimes did not eat — at home.

The results have been spectacular. The number of obese French kids — children are defined as obese if they are 20% or more above the recommended weight for their height and age — has doubled from 6% to 12% over the past decade. But the increase in obese students from Laventie and neighboring Fleurbaix, where the nutrition program also runs, has been an ultraslim 1%, one of the lowest rates in the country.

Families, too, benefit, as children teach their parents what a healthy, well-balanced meal looks like. "When I go with my children to shop at the supermarket my daughter will look at the label and advise me what is and isn't healthy, and why," says Patricia Vanecloo, headmistress at St. Joan of Arc and mother of two students there.