It's back to school across the nation. Time to let the learning and teaching begin anew. It's also time for a busload of back-to-school media stories.

One education-related piece in particular caught my eye. It came from The Brookings Institution. The article was written by researchers from Temple University and the University of Delaware whose study appears in the latest issue of Mind, Brain, and Education. The study suggests that bringing early childhood education outside school walls could be helpful in closing the achievement gap. Called The Supermarket Study, it revolves around an experiment leveraging the huge variety of food in a supermarket as a vocabulary builder and as a device to encourage educational conversations between parents and young children.

The study was designed to spark conversation in various sections of the store as parents and children move up and down the aisles. In the dairy section, for example, the store might place a sign that says: "I come from a cow. Can you find something else that comes from a cow?"

The authors of the study reason that supermarkets are filled with stacked cans, labels to read and cash registers, which can be used to build mathematical skills. The study's approach, they suggest, is simply riding on the coattails of the behavioral tools and stimulation that all products use to prompt a consumer to buy.

The researchers believe the preliminary results to be promising. In stores in low-income communities, presence of the signs was associated with a 33 percent increase in conversations between parents and children, an increase equaling the amount of talk that happened naturally in the supermarkets frequented by middle-income consumers.

But here's where the skeptic in me steps in. What was the substance of those parent-child conversations? From what I read, it seems that the topics were very much focused on the center aisles, as opposed to the out-of-the-way areas where the fresh and natural foods generally reside. Don't get me wrong; it's not that this is a terrible idea, but it is a corruptible one. Supermarkets sell a vast amount of unhealthful, as well as heavily marketed, processed foods. If widely implemented, would such a program become a magnet for sponsorship by the makers of less-than-healthful products? Would these signs increase spending on impulse purchases of unhealthful items? Would implementing The Supermarket Study merely reinforce existing buying patterns when the kind of education that changes attitudes is needed in steering us away from the foods that are detrimental to our health?

At the end of the day, a supermarket's job is to sell products, not to dispense health education. It's completely on parents to make good choices, and that's no easy task. It's hard to be informed when most labels of products directed at children, for example, don't distinguish between "added" sugars and natural sugars, those that naturally occur in fruit and in dairy products. Excessive sugar is found everywhere in processed food and packed into almost everything directed at children. On average, Americans consume 19.5 teaspoons of added sugar per day. For children, it's much more, says Robert Lustig, a pediatric endocrinologist who runs a weight management clinic for children and families at the University of California, San Francisco.

Even processed products that appear healthful are high in sugar to make them tastier to kids, as well as low in fiber to extend shelf life. Yogurt — a healthful product known around the world for being chock-full of good stuff such as vitamin B-2, vitamin B-12, potassium, probiotics and magnesium, which aid digestion — is supposed to taste sour. Except in America, where it is manufactured to taste like a dessert.

In a world where obesity is an epidemic that has more than doubled in the past 30 years, picking products with lower sugar content could make a big difference for a child. Creating the kind of school reform that encourages smart communities that have learning at their core is at the heart of this study, the authors say. Well then, how about using such communication starters between parents and children to also help educate the adults?

For starters, ditch the supermarket and head to your nearest farmers market. You'll be spending more time outdoors, which is good. Here parents and children will benefit not only by talking about natural products but also by engagement with the farmers behind the food.

"This is especially true with children, who are more likely to try fresh produce if they actually meet the farmer," says Alice Ammerman, a professor of nutrition at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health.

If there isn't a farmers market near you, there most likely will be soon. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that the number of farmers markets is on the rise, increasing by 180 percent from 2006 to 2014. To help you locate one, the USDA has developed an online search tool, at http://www.ams.usda.gov/local-food-directories/farmersmarkets.

Let's also support schools such as Eastern Senior High School in Washington, D.C., where students can be found hard at work harvesting a garden filled with vegetables and herbs. Such "learning gardens" are proving to be an effective tool in student engagement and increased academics. Since starting their garden programs, some schools have seen a 15 percent increase in the number of students passing standardized tests. At the same time, one group found that 73 percent of the students working in the school garden reported increasing their consumption of produce.

Another innovative program, recently launched in California, is trying to raise money to grow fruit trees in 1,000 schools in low-income areas across the state by 2025. Once planted, the orchards will provide students with access to fresh fruit that's free for the picking. Money will also go toward developing agriculture-focused curricula and activities to encourage students to make healthy choices and boost school performance.

Write to Chuck Norris ([email protected]) with your questions about health and fitness. Follow Chuck Norris through his official social media sites, on Twitter @chucknorris and Facebook's "Official Chuck Norris Page." He blogs at http://chucknorrisnews.blogspot.com. To find out more about Chuck Norris and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.