Health Promoting Schools

What you expect - is what you get?

Pygmalion effect “the difference between a lady and a flower girl is not

how she behaves, but how she's treated. I shall always be a flower girl to Professor Higgins, because he always treats me as a flower girl, and always will, but I know I can be a lady to you because you always treat me as a lady, and always will."

- Early, unplanned pregnancy- Sexual abuse- High risk of infectious disease- Failure to graduate- Sexual exploitation- Low paying jobs- Support males -Care provider for parents/ siblings, and extended family members- self-worth defined by what others want

Is that all there is…?

What impression do you expect health and physical education to make on

children’s lives?

• Follow guidance and advice of health community (medical, scholastic, pharmaceutical…)

• Read health messages intelligently – observed, anecdotal….

• Adopt health enhancing habits…• Help others enjoy a healthy life…• Work to develop surroundings that

support and build health…• Become health literate … read the world,

participate in the knowledge economy (access, produce, share, interpret, sell knowledge…)

What role should the school play in this process?

• Are schools equipped to do the job?• Are teachers interested?• Are teachers prepared?• Are parents interested?• Are students interested?

For a school to expect to produce certain outcomes, what needs to be

in place?

Do you expect it to become embedded in the culture of the

school?

That means, health (the principles and practices that define leading-edge approaches to school-based health

promotion) must be an integral part of:

- curriculum and instruction - governance

- life world of school - community partnerships

- planning - promoting - building

In other words, organize, operate, improve with health in mind

Do you expect HPE

• To be a course of study• Or school philosophy• Or a fundamental part of how a

school/community system works?

• Walking school bus…. Who would be at the table if it was designed systemically/comprehensively?

Health defined as: care for self, others and the

environment

Leading edge instruction makes evident the connection between

learning and doing good; relating what we know to making things better for self, others and the

environment

?

• There are 120 sheep and five dogs, how old is the shepherd?

Triangulate: knowing, doing, valuing Empathy

Literacy Action competency

Curriculum and instruction, through HPE should prepare students to: see the possibilities for improvement and see the opportunities at hand for them to have a say, take a stand, act.

Asking provocative questions

• What if there was a pill

• what

Examples of classroom challenges that make health an integral part of

academic learning• The more television a child watches the

more s/he tends to eat (junk food).• One consequence of children’s television watching is increased caloric intake. American researchers

have found that for every hour of TV that children watched, they ate the equivalent of a bag of chips. A 20-month study of 548 children with a mean age of 11.7 found they hovered 167 more calories of food for every hour of TV they watched each day. (Maclean’s Magazine, Volume 119 No. 19, 2006, p. 11 High Fat TV.)

• What are the messages that can be ‘read’ from this research finding?

• Between ages 11- 65 the average American watches 7 years of television.

• How long does it take to complete a degree in medicine? Certification in Auto mechanics? Licensure for Commercial Photography?

Example #2• 98% of violent crimes are committed by

men. Why are men so violent?

• What does it mean to be masculine?

Who said? “Whether you are a man or not depends on

your heart not how much hair you have on your head?”

a) Bruce Willisb) Damon Wayans • List ways boys can support (look out) for

each other.

Example #3

“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world” – Anne Frank

“There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you its going to be a butterfly” – Buckminster Fuller

A theory of learning

• There is a distinction between knowledge as “acquired for a test” and knowing as participation in rich contexts where one gains an appreciation for both the content and the situations in which it has value. Central to this perspective is the belief that concepts, skills etc. are tools – tools that can only be fully understood in use. The primary tenets f this perspective with respect to knowing are that (a) knowing is an activity – not a thing; (b) knowing is always contextualized – not abstract; (c) knowing is reciprocally constructed in the individual - environment interaction – not objectively defined or subjectively created; and (d) knowing is a functional stance on the interaction – not a ‘truth’ (Educational Researcher - Roth and Barab, 2006, p. 3)

• Education generates more than good test scores, job prospects…

• It is at the moment of doubt that real thinking begins - Andy

Canadians are on the move B.C. is home to nearly 1 million

Canadians born elsewhere. 253 000 B.C. born Canadians live in the rest of Canada.

Alberta has 802 000 persons born in other parts of the country? A total of 402 000 born in that province lived elsewhere.

Saskatchewan 535 000 reside elsewhere while 124 000 arrived as newcomers.

• 75% of the residences in B.C., born elsewhere, were likely to feel at home.

• What makes a place a good place to live?• What makes YOUR community a good place to

live?• What could we do to make our place a better place

to live?• What can we do at our school to welcome

newcomers and those who move to new places?

• A well struck golf ball travels 200 kilometers an hour, at that rate how long would it take to pass the length of your playing field?

• Calculate the savings you get when you buy a car in the U.S. versus Canada?

• Prepare a survey to determine which school in the district is the most courteous.

Health as cultural studies

• A kiss is just a kiss – or is it?• Children’s games - Bruegel • Design an e-kitchen, an eco-kitchen

Health and happiness

• ½ of happiness is provided at birth, but what about the other half and how do you manage to live in the top half?

• Can laughter be the best medicine?• Laughter is a way to massage your

internal organs• Create a plan of happiness for

everyday……

Health and citizenry

• Angel hair

• Pugdog