Back to school is an exciting, stressful, energizing, challenging time! In honor of this back-to-school season, Healthier Generation just released a “toolkit” with tips and ideas to promote positivity, family bonding, and holistic health.
As per the free download: “This toolkit is full of activities and resources to help your family feel well, live well, and learn well during this busy transitional season.”
Check out the Healthier Generation toolkit here – and try one of the strategies today!
Alliance for a Healthier Generation, whose mission is to “promote healthy environments so that young people can achieve lifelong good health”, offers an online Healthier Generation Training Center that is available with a free membership. One recently posted training, Fostering Belonging through Physical Activity, is a short 20-minute session where “participants will take away resources and simple strategies for integrating physical activity during transition time to and from out-of-school programming.”
Link to training: E-Learning: Fostering Belonging through Physical Activity
From the Division of Adolescent and School Health within the CDC, this page offers an excellent compilation of resources and methods for managing classes and enhancing connectedness. “CDC researchers reviewed scientific papers on classroom management and identified these classroom management approaches that promote student connectedness and engagement. Strategies to support these approaches were identified through a structured review of web-based practice resources.”
The resources are categorized into six themes, each with research, examples, tools, and additional links:
While this resource is not specific to classroom physical activity, it does address holistic wellness, student learning, and classroom climate, all of which can directly or indirectly impact student activity and the likelihood of success for classroom movement.
Check out the index page here: https://www.cdc.gov/healthyyouth/classroom-management/index.htm
This campaign, from the Trauma Responsive Educational Practices (TREP) Project, strives to promote awareness of mental health and support for students during the first 30 days back at school. By pledging to engage students in mental health lessons, educators will receive access to a resource guide on how to talk with students about mental health.
For information, see the 30 Days of Mental Health to Start the Academic Year website.
In honor of back-to-school and, for some, the first back-to-in-person-teaching in 20 months, here is a repost of a 2018 entry…
Content. This is the C that drives our education system. The content is the material that we want students to learn in our classrooms. Recently, I went to a college teaching conference and, along with the end of semester experiences, facilitated a reflection on what I want my students to take away from my classes. While I agree that the content is a critical component, I also acknowledge that if we teach students how to learn, they can look up content in the moment. Plus, necessary content is often specific to the situation and the environment, which may not be the same content that I offer in my curriculum. Therefore, I propose several additional important Cs…
Communication
Being able to communicate effectively via multiple mediums is a life skill that requires practice. Especially in a generation rife with electronic communication, providing students with opportunities to practice listening and to dialogue with peers, write professionally, and present orally sets them up for future success.
Collaboration
Ah, working with others! Being able to communicate is a sub-set of collaboration, but working in a group presents unique challenges, especially when you’re paired with someone who wants to do nothing…or everything. Navigating group-work situations while in schools enables students to gain perspective and experience that will inform the group-work that will inevitably present itself in professional life.
Conscientiousness
Being conscientious is often an intrinsic characteristic, but one that can be modeled and encouraged. As with communication, providing students with opportunities to practice may enable them to increase their awareness of how to be conscientious. This includes skills such as respect, time management, organization, consistency, punctuality, professionalism, and effective communication.
Compassion
Compassion is also an intrinsic characteristic that can be promoted. Sharing stories and information to broaden students’ perspectives may increase their ability to understand and respect differences. Compassion can also be modeled, both in teacher-student interactions, and by creating a safe and effective classroom climate that generates respectful dialogue. Compassion for self is also critical, and students should be encouraged to reinvent negative self-talk (ex: change “I’m not a good writer” to “I’m still working to improve my writing”). Interesting find: Wharton Commencement Speech 2018
Creativity
Too often in education, the content piece overshadows creativity as students strive to present the “right” answer. Innovation and creativity may be squashed in a system that offers a specific rubric that rewards students for linear responses to demonstrate knowledge and understanding. However, creativity is an integral part of problem solving and resourcefulness, both marketable traits for professional success, and should be cultivated.
Over the past year and a half, the topic of social-emotional learning for students has emerged as a conversation front-runner. This is a much-needed discussion and essential to the overall health and well-being of our youth population. However, we must not overlook the psychological health of our teachers! I recently heard a great analogy – putting on your own oxygen mask before helping others on the airplane is like focusing on your own mental health so you can support mental health in others. It is critical to promote and enhance teachers’ social-emotional-mental health so that they have the capacity to foster a safe, supportive, inclusive, effective, healthy learning environment for students. As such, I applaud these materials put out by the Southern Education Foundation:
Teacher Stress and Burnout: The High Cost of Low Social and Emotional Development (July 2021)
“Teachers are the most important school-based factor in student success, impacting every aspect of students’ achievement and overall development.”
Burnout. A common and distressing problem, especially among teachers. And, over the past year, circumstances leading to stress, anxiety, and burnout have escalated. While self-care has always been an essential component for holistic health among teachers, it may be even more critical now.
Thankfully, the scope of resources for teachers that address psychological wellness, coping strategies, and self-care continues to expand. Taking advantage of these resources may help enable us to be at our best as teachers, a benefit which translates directly to the health of our students.
In a free webinar from SHAPE America, The How — How to Be Combative to Our Stress Levels, “participants will be introduced to several strategies for promoting self-care and creating a personal self-care plan.”
Access the webinar here (free account needed): https://www.shapeamerica.org/prodev/webinars/Free-webinars.aspx#the-how
From Action for Healthy Kids, the week of April 26, 2021 is designed to promote awareness and action to get “every kid healthy”. Resources are available for school and for home and cover a different theme each day.
Mindful Monday: Social emotional health
Tasty Tuesday: Nutrition and food access
Wellness Wednesday: Self-care strategies
Thoughtful Thursday: Connectedness, relationship skill, social awareness
Fitness Friday: Physical activity and active play
Check out the ideas and materials here! https://www.actionforhealthykids.org/every-kid-healthy-week-resources
This February, Active Schools is hosting an Active Classrooms Month! If you haven’t had the opportunity to check out the Active Schools website, it’s a great resource for promoting and supporting physical activity among children and youth: https://www.activeschoolsus.org
Active Classrooms Month is designed to increase awareness of how movement can be integrated into learning and will include a variety of activities, including a series of weekly webinars. These 30-minute sessions will occur on Wednesdays at 3:00pm ET / 12:00pm PT and will offer information about and strategies for classroom physical activity implementation. Click here for calendar and links to register!
It was my pleasure to speak with a staff writer from the American Heart Association about physical activity and the associations with learning preparedness, health, and the current challenges. A colleague from my first teaching job provided additional perspective for the article. One of my favorite parts of this experience was the comment from the writer when he shared the story: “Thanks…for inspiring me to move around a little bit myself.” How cool is that?!
Read the article here: How to keep kids active while learning from home – and why that’s vital
