The weather is getting warmer, which means there are more opportunities for Hoosiers to get outside and get active.

This week on Noon Edition, experts answered your questions on the best ways to stay healthy through the summer months.

Here are  five questions our guests answered in our show:

This conversation has been edited for clarity and conciseness.

What are the best ways to get started into an exercise routine without hurting yourself?

Margie Kobow: It's all about just moving. Initially moving and then starting out slow, walking and then adding some jogging in there. We have a running group, but we always get several walkers, people who have always walked and have always had a little desire to run. And we start them out walking three minutes and then we jog for a minute, and then we kind of build up from there, and do it by minutes and not necessarily by miles because your miles are always going to come along.

It seems like there's more awareness about health and wellness, but obesity rates are going up. What can we do about this?

Robin Parker: A really easy method that we use and that we promote is the plate method. And using your plate, about a nine to ten inch plate, a quarter of a plate should be a protein food, and the rest of the plate should come from the earth, a quarter a plate holding a portion of food. That gives you some sort of boundaries of what a real portion looks like versus the portions we're getting from a platter we're getting in a restaurant, or the portion we're getting from a bag in the fast food drive-thru.

What are some fun ways to get started exercising?

Alison Miller: I just think about all the awesome outdoor opportunities we have specifically in Bloomington, all the trails and parks, and we have canoeing on Griffy Lake and stand-up paddle boarding on Griffy Lake, and there's so many different ways to be active outside. Of course, it's finding something you enjoy, finding something that would be like playing with your friends when you were a kid.

For people who go through major weight loss through intensive programs, how do you keep those pounds from coming back?

Robin Parker: My take on anytime you're going to change your eating to lose weight,  just remember, you can't separate the means from the end. So whatever means you choose to meet that goal of weight loss is probably going to be an means you're going to have live with for the rest of your life to some extent. So if it's so extreme that you're not going to be able to maintain that, then you're not going to be successful in keeping that weight loss.

Do new fitness technologies like Fitbits actually work?

Michelle Miller: I think it's accountability, I mean, it's huge. If you don't have social support, if you don't belong to a group, or if you don't have a huge family or have that family support, you can go about by yourself, and if you haven't reached ten thousand steps for that day, walk until you reach ten thousand steps.

Our guests:

Alison Miller, Active Living Coalition, City of Bloomington

Robin Parker, Community Health Clinical Manager, IU Health Bloomington

Michelle Miller, Professor at the Indiana University School of Public Health

Margie Kobow, Healthy Hearts & Active Lives Program Director, Monroe County YMCA