Session 5: Curriculum, Teaching and Learning towards Health Promoting Schools

Objectives:
At the end of the session, the participants will be able to:
1. Explain the distinctive characteristics of an effective school health education program;
2. Identify the different approaches that facilitate child-centered teaching and experiential learning; and
3. Appreciate the need to work together and prepare the school health promotion action plan.

Content:
* Characteristics of an Effective School Health Education Program
* Approaches that Facilitate Child-Centered Teaching and Experiential Learning

Materials:
Cassette recorder, tape "I Have a Dream" or any related song; charts.

Methodology:
A. Introduction/Mood Setting:
1. Introduce the session by linking with session 4: Health Promoting Schools
2. Explain that this session is a attempt to look more closely o curriculum, teaching and learning as a component of a HPS. (Show diagram of HPS)
3. Set the mood and begin the activity by playing and singing the song "I Have a Dream" Invite the participants to give insights o the song.

B. Activity:
1. Invite participants to dream of a school-based health education program in a child-friendly school environment. Let them describe their dream by writing ideas/phrases in sheet of paper.
2. Group participants. Let them share their dreams with group  members and come up with a group dream.
3. Ask each group to put a learning center to advocate the school's health education  program as envisioned by the group.
4. Allow center visitation by the different groups. Then ask 2 to 3 participants to share their observations/learning from the centers.
5. Ask the following questions after the sharing:
* What do you notice as common or typical among the centers? How are they different?
* What messages do the centers covey?
* How would you describe a health education program i a CFS environment?
6. Deliver a lecturrete on:
* Creating Health Promoting Schools
* Elements of a Successful Curriculum-Based Schools Health Program
* Approaches that Promote Child-Centered Teaching and Learning Experience
7. Link the energizer to the group's dream of a health education program in a child-friendly school environment
8. Ask the group to invent a human functioning machine that will be useful in their health education program.
9. Process the activity-emphasize working together/team work to attain group goals, development of life skills i.e. decision-making.

C. Learning Point:
* Draw out from the participants the following:
* Characteristics of a effective school health education program
* Approaches that facilitate child-centered teaching ad experiential learning

D. Application:
* Make a School Health Action Plan (please see attached)

Curriculum Teaching Learning
* Student centered teaching
* Experiential learning
* Planned sequential curriculum
* Pre-service & in-service training
* Health topics integrated into other subjects

School Organizations, Ethos & Environment
* Resource allocation for health
* Based on social justice principle
* Clean
* Shade
* Health promoting
* School policy
* Passive Recreational areas
* Occupational health & safety
* Physical activity areas
* Respectful of diversity
* Friendly waste disposal
* Caring ethos underpins
* Social interactions
* Based on social justice principles
* Staff Health & Welfare

THE HEALTH PROMOTING SCHOOL

Partnerships & Services
* Local health services contribute to school health through-screening immunization, education of teachers and parents, expert advice on referral and policy development
* School welfare services
* School/community members involved in initiation development and implementation of school health policies & programs
* Community use of school facilities
* Alliance formed with health, welfare & local community agencies

Creating Health Promoting Schools
* Health Promoting School
* The Basic Vision
* School Health Goals and Plans
* Characteristics of a school Health Education Program

Health Promoting School
" A Health Promoting School is a place where all members of the school community work together to provide students with integrated and positive experiences and structures which promote and protect their health. This includes both the formal and informal curricula on health, the creation of safe and healthy school environment, the provision of appropriate health services and the involvement of the family and the community in their efforts to promote health"

The Basic Vision
Health promoting school approach lead to improved teaching and learning atmosphere, delivery of quality health care and eventually help in social, mental, physical and emotional development of children turning them out healthy, responsible and productive citizens of society.

School Health Goals and Plans
* School should have health goals that relate to local needs and emerging priorities.
* Each health goal should be supported by a plan that includes specific and measurable objectives to achieve the goal. This plan should also include activities to achieve the objectives.
* Objectives should be realistic and attainable, recognizing the context i which the school operates. Objectives with the greatest health impact and which can be achieved with existing resources should be given priority.
* Health goals and objectives should be known and understood by all members of the school community, including the children. Everyone should have a role in achieving these goals and objectives.
* School health activities should include simple systems of monitoring ad evaluation, using checklist to assess progress in implementing activities and achieving objectives. The systems should be open and designed to be run by the school staff including the children.

Characteristic of a school Health Education Program
* Health education in schools can be taught as a particular subject like science and health, integrated into various subjects like social studies, mathematics, etc. or included in extracurricular activities.
* Health knowledge and skills emphasizing life skills should be reinforced in the curriculum with opportunities to apply such learnings in the school, home and community.
* A health education curriculum should be planned and help achieve the school's health objectives.
* Health content is an ideal way of developing skills in language, mathematics and science.
Example: written and spoken language, measuring, observing.
* The health education curriculum should not be overload. School should focus on an identified health issue for one or more grading periods.
* Health education should enable students to acquire values and attitudes and help them adopt healthy lifestyles and create conditions conducive to health.

Characteristic of a school Health Education Program
* Health education should implement learning with doing to make school a healthier place.
* Health education should involve children in planning and implementing the school health program.
* Activity learning not only makes learning relevant and enjoyable but also encourages children to think, act, feel and communicate health related issues.
* Cooperative learning where children help each other in class is recommended. It promotes understanding and develop healthy attitudes.

Elements of a successful Curriculum-Based School Health Program
1. Teacher training and support
* Pre-service training
* On-going professional development
* Teacher support
* In-service training
* Teacher autonomy and commitment
2. Life skills acquisition
3. Adequate resources
4. Teaching ad learning strategies
5. Time allocation
6. Comprehensive health promotion programs
7. Team approach
8. Involvement of local community
9. Environment support

Approaches that Promote Student Centered Teaching and Experiential Learning
* Teaching through themes
* Integrated learning
* Experiential
* Learning centers approach
* Child-to-child Approach which link school, home and community

Example of Health Themes and Subtopics for Study are as follows:
Theme: Hygiene
Subtopics/Messages:
1. Wash hands with soap and water
2. Proper waste disposal
3. Use only clean water
4. Prepare food properly

Example of Health Concepts and Activities which can easily be Integrated in Social Studies:
1. Concepts related to food we eat, community hygiene, immunization and the prevention of epidemics, effect of pollution on community health, food production, water management and its relation to healthy lives.
2. Rights and duties of citizens with regards to health; health issues relating to rights of women and children.
3. Recognition of the relationship between poverty and ill health.
4.Making health map of the neighborhood and locating health services o a local map.
5. Survey of practices of local people on treating fever or attitudes towards parents with AIDS.

Sample of Concepts and Activities which can Easily be Integrated in Mathematics 
1. Getting people's weight; measuring number of breaths per minute of a person after exercise.
2. Estimating distance from the classroom to the school clinic; recording numbers of case of malaria; make graphs of this and relate it to the amount of rainfall in the area.
3. Measuring, weighing and recording a person's weight regularly.
4. Budgeting for healthy meals.
5. Cost of water consumption on a monthly basis.
6. Survey of incidents of illness due to diseases.
7. Counting family members; comparing age.

Steps in the Development of a Learning Center
1. Instructional purpose. Decide on the purpose of the center. What objective(s) do you want to accomplish? A teacher may want to set up a science ad health center where students can try out and experiment on foods in order to develop specific health concepts. A center is an environment arranged to accomplish a particular instructional purpose.
2. Activity. What will the students do at the center? What activities are to be performed? Whatever the activity, it should accomplish the instructional purpose. If the purpose is to reinforce a skill, then the activity should provide practice and application to the learned skill.
3. Materials. Decide what materials will be needed for the students to perform the activity. Center materials can include books, paper, pictures, magazine, tapes, manipulate materials, etc.
4. Evaluation. How will the activity evaluated? Some activities can be designed so that students ca self-check their work. If the activity has answers, correct responses can be provided in a booklet located in the center. Evaluation can also be a joint student-teacher activity and may involve a classroom discussion instead of a paper-pencil check.

Child-to-Child Approach Linking the School, Home and Community
Living Place
*Learning place
Step 1- Choosing ad understanding
* Chalk and Talk, Discussion Group, Stories, Pictures, Games, Needs Assessment, Role Playing Experiments and Demonstration
Step 2- Finding out more
* Surveys, Interviews, Recording information (graphs,chart etc) measuring, comparing
Step 3- Reporting, discussion and planning
* Reporting, Describing, Discussion, Debate, Group Work, Preparation and Practice for Step 4 activities
Step 4- Taking action (individually and together)
* Campaigns, school fairs & open days
* Poster & Picture-making
* Drama &puppets
* Songs &poems
* Demonstrations
* Radio programmers
* Teaching other skills, games songs etc.
Step 5- Discussing what we did
* Reporting Describing, Discussions,Role play
Step 6- Doing it better
* As for Step 4

Guidelines on the Preparation of the School Health Action Plan
1. Identify the school-community specific health needs through a situational analysis
2. Establish priorities and focus on relevant health needs/issues
3. Develop health themes on the prioritized health needs. Select health themes that:
* children do not know or practice
* addresses the needs of the community
* children are capable of learning and doing
* children can pass o the messages to others
4. Decide which themes the school will concentrate for each grading period.
5. Select specific health topics for each class/grade level (How many topics will you cover in each class per grading).
6. Decide on how many lessons will be committed to health education intervention activity. (How many lessons will you spend for each health theme or topic)?

Session 4: The Health Promoting School (HPS)

Objectives:

At the end of the session, the participants will demonstrate

1. a clearer understanding of the Health Promoting School (HPS) concepts.

2. knowledge on the development of a health promoting school.

Content:

Health Promoting Concepts

* Components of Health Promoting Schools

* Characteristics of a Health Promoting Schools

Materials:

Puzzle, checklist "How is your school", cartolina - red, purple, blue, light yellow. Transparencies on background, definitions, components of HPS including benefits derived from HPS.

Training Methodology
A. Introduction/Mood Setting
* Distribute the puzzle to the participants

 A  B  Z  R  P  W  A  E  F

 E  D  M  S  R  E  U  H  G

 N  F  M  T  O  R  O  L M

 C  G  N  U  M  I  C  O  S

 H  L  P  V  O  S  D  N  C

 H  E  A  L  T  H  B  C  H

 B  C M  P  I   J   I    K  O

 F  G  E  Q  N  E  R  J   O

 H  K  L  M  G  O  P  S  L

* Ask the participants to look for three words contained in the puzzle.

* Give them three minutes to do the task individually.

* After three minutes;

  Ask: What words did you find? (Health Promoting School)

  What do the words imply?

B. Activity

1. Divide the participants by school. Give each group the checklist on "How Healthy is Your School".

2. Give the following directions:

  a. Cooperatively answer the checklist. There are 24 items in the checklist. Check the items that best describe your school.

   b. Count the items you checked and write your score on the box at the end of the list.

   c. If you scored 23-24 points give yourselves a RED HEART; if you scored 18-22 give yourselves a BLUE HEART; if you scored 13-17 give yourselves a LIGHT YELLOW HEART. You may cut your heart from the cartolinas available in the room. Write the name of your school on the heart.

3. Call the attention of the participants to the big RED, PURPLE, BLUE, and LIGHT YELLOW HEART posted in front.

4. Ask them to present their group rating and explain why they got such heart,

5. Let them post their heart to the corresponding BIG HEART in front.

6. Synthesize different group ratings and discuss areas for improvement.

7. Give lecturette on the following;

* The rationale of HPS Approach

* Definition of a Health Promoting School (HPS)

* Benefits of the school from the HPS Approach

C. Learning Points

Solicit from the participants the important insights they gained from the session.

Ask: Are you satisfied with your rating? Why? Why not?

D. Application

Cite how you make your school a health promoting school based on the different aspects.

     Aspect                                                              What to do in my school

  Curriculum, Teaching and Learning

  School Organization, Ethos and Environment

  School Partnership and Services

End the session with this food for thought 

* Children are like wet cement. We can mold them, shape or leave them alone and blindly hope that they wil make it in life. What difference it will make if we learn to invest our time, treasure and talents to cultivate the lives of those entrusted to us by God Almighty.

                              How Healthy is Your School

School___________________________________________________ Region______________
District___________________________________________________ Division_____________
Respondent/s__________________________________________________________________

Check the items that best describe your school
1. Does your school enhance the children's heath and well-being.
    Do you have or are you doing the following?

() Your school maintains and regularly updates a health record of each pupils.
() Your school holds annual weighing and health examination of your pupils.
() Your school holds annual dental examination of your pupils.
() Your school treats or refers pupils with health problem.
() Your school treats pupils with decayed teeth.
() Your school ha a feeding program for malnourished children.
() Your school serves or sells healthy and nutritious food in your premises.
() Your school practice proper waste disposal.
() Your school has a steady supply of clean and safe drinking water.
() Your school has a separate toilet facilities for boys and girls consisting of urinals and lavatories that are regularly maintained and kept clean.
() Your school has a functional clinic.

2. Does your school guarantee safe ad protective spaces for children?

() Your classrooms have proper ventilation and lightning ad enough space for 45-50 pupils.
() Your classroom desk and other furniture are sized to the age of the pupils. In the case of shared desk, each pupils has enough space to do seatwork.
() Your classrooms layout ad furniture allow pupils to interact and do group work.
() Your classrooms have a bulletin board or a corner that displays helpful learning materials such as posters, illustrations, newspaper and magazine clippings, and your pupils own works.
() Your classrooms, facilities and premises are regularly maintained and kept clean.
() Your school has library for reading and for study.
() Your school has facilities and equipment for recreation and sports.
() Your school has sufficient lawn and space and vegetation.
() Your school has duly assigned personnel in charge of securing it's premises, its properties ad those of it's pupils and teachers.
() Your school coordinates with the barangay and local authorities to ensure the safety and protection of your pupils.
() Your school has a policy against discrimination with regard to gender, cultural origin, social status, religious belief and others.
() Your school has a program for children with special needs.
() Your school use non-threatening styles of disciplines.

Rationale for HPS Approach
a.) More effective and comprehensive approach to learning
* Holistic view of the physical, social, mental, intellectual, spiritual, ad environment dimensions of health
b.) Teachers and school community focused for students HP.
* Teachers as key figures on the lives of children
c.) Takes into account health research and need for integrated health service delivery
* Good health and education are interrelated
* Social morbidity
* Integrated approach for health service delivery
d.) Health education and promotion are cost effective
e.) HPS approach a framework to draw current activity
f.) HPS adopt a more effective approach compared to vertical programs

What is Health Promoting School (HPS)
* A place where all members of the school community work together to provide students with the integrated and positive experiences and structures which promote ad protect their health.

Includes:
* Formal and informal health health curricula
* Safe and healthy school environment
* Provision of appropriate health service
* Involvement of the family and community

Three Components of Health Promoting School
1.) Curriculum, Teaching and Learning
- Provides sufficient information
- Develop skills relevant to physical & phychosocialhealth
* Decision-making
* Abilities to participate
* Self-assertion, communication
* Personnel values, positive self-concept
2.) School Orgaization, Ethos and Environment
- Encompass the whole school environment
* Physical environment
* Social relations
* Organizations structure
* Policies and practices

Physical Environment
* Adequate lightning and ventilation
* Ideal classroom size
* Adequate classroom
* Adequate water ad sanitation
* Adequate play ad safe recreation facilities
* Social interaction areas

Social Relations
- School climate-relationship among staff
* Openness of communication
* Responsiveness to suggestions for change
* Collegial atmosphere
* Mutual helpfulness
- Classroom climate
* Teacher-student and student-student relationship

Organization Structure
* School Health Committee
* Clinic/First Aid Teachers
* School Health Workers
* Little Doctors and Nurses

Policies and Practices
* Day to day guidelines and incentives
* Types of food served and sold
* Wearing of protective equipment
* Involvement in decision-making
* No smoking policy