Introduction to Health
Students remember that health means taking care of our whole self, and that there are five bubbles on the wellness wheel; physical, environmental, emotional, social, and intellectual. Students identify the healthy things they already do for each category of the wellness wheel.
What Makes Something Healthy?
Students frequently ask about whether or not certain foods or behaviors are healthy. This lesson will provide the tools to discern what makes something healthy for their individual bodies. Students are taught to assess safety and tune into the messages and signals that their body gives them about foods and activities.
Food | Listening to Our Internal Cues
We get a lot of messages from people telling us what we should and shouldn’t eat. But your body is the best messenger. We are all different, which means you need to listen to your body and how your body feels after eating different foods. Your body knows best! Students sketch pictures of different foods that give them energy, they enjoy, don't enjoy, only like when prepared a certain way, makes them feel sick, and only like sometimes. This lesson is based on an intuitive eating framework that seeks to remove power from food, normalize that our body’s have different needs, and help young people tune in to their internal cues.
Additional Resources for Parents & Caregivers:
Brain Scavenger Hunt
Students will work in partners as they walk around the classroom reading a series of posters with brain facts on them to uncover an answer to a brain puzzle. This lesson introduces intellectual health as a component of their wellness.
Helmets
Helmet protect our skull, and skulls protect our brains, so wearing a helmet is important! Students learn how to tell if a helmet fits their hear properly, respond to "what would you do" scenarios, and write a comic strip encouraging their peers to always wear a helmet.
A Healthy Brain
We read a Kid's Book About Brain Health and learn five things that help our brains stay healthy; exercise, getting 9 hours of sleep, eating brain foods, taking care of their emotions, and trying new things. Student's asses their own brain health behaviors and think of something new they will try to stretch their brain.
To learn more about the brain and nervous system, watch this video at home.
Gratitude
We often think of gratitude as something we focus on around Thanksgiving but it’s a practice that more and more research is finding is good for our emotional, physical, intellectual, and relational health. Students learn what it means to have a gratitude practice, play a gratitude game, and fill their own gratitude jars.
Sleep
Having previously learned that our brains need at least 9 hours of sleep each night, students dive into healthy sleep habits and the reasons for prioritizing good sleep. Each student leaves this lesson with an assessment of their own sleep habits and a new personalized sleep routine.
Feelings | Emotional Heath
Students identify physical sensations that are connected to emotions in short scenarios about Taylor. We read, Breath by Breath and do breathing exercises as a class.
Coping | Don't Bottle Up Your Emotions
Once we identify our emotions, the next step is to determine how to best care for or cope with that emotion. We practice and brainstorm a variety of coping strategies that are safe, doable, and effective. Students use a worksheet to identify their favorite ways to cope.
Empathy
We move from recognizing emotions in ourselves to recognizing emotions in others. Empathy is shown to help regulate stress, manage emotions, and encourage positive decision making. It is also critical to maintaining healthy relationships. Students use scenarios to practice empathetic communication.
Self-Esteem/Self-Confidence - Me Tree
A positive self esteem helps us to communicate, problem-solve, cope, work through conflict, and make healthful decisions. Students identify things that might lower or raise someone's self esteem and create a "me-tree" representing all of the positive things about themselves. When we think highly of ourselves we are more likely to care for ourselves!
Self-Esteem II - Confidence Shield
In the first lesson students identified the behaviors and spaces that helped them to feel their best, and boost their self-esteem. The second lesson focuses on how to stay confident when we’re in a negative or tricky environment. Students will create a Confidence Shield with 4 categories: things I am good at, things I like about myself, people who build me up, and things I can say to myself to feel strong. By the end of the two lessons on self-esteem and self-confidence, students should be able to explain what confidence is and identify people, thoughts, and behaviors that help them to feel confident.
Environmental Health
Our environments play an important role in our individual health. We reflect on the relationship between our environment and our health with a focus on our school environment. Students identify the areas of the school that they feel help them to be healthy and choose one area of the school that they would like to improve. Students then reflect on the aspects of the school environment which they have control over and can have an impact. They braintorm one way that they can make the school environment a healthier place for everyone.
My Wellness Wheel
A culmination of all that was covered during 3rd grade health. Students look back at the wellness wheel and create a personal map of their wellness, outlining what each category of health looks like for their individual self.
*Lessons may not be taught in the order shown, and some lessons are missed due to snow days, field trips, and other events.