Learning Links
Addictive Behaviors / Grief / Student Organizations / Support Groups / Relaxation / Drug Therapy / Self- expression / Counseling / Assertiveness / Arts and Crafts / Self-discipline
Related Concepts
Self-esteem / Interpersonal Relationship Skills / Communication / Stress Management / Refusal Skills / Conflict Resolution / Goal Setting / Self-assessment / Time Management
Demonstrators should be read from bottom to top, but need not be demonstrated sequentially.
Elementary Demonstrators
• Practice interpersonal skills which contribute to healthy relationships and self-esteem.
• Recognize the factors that influence self- esteem.
• Demonstrate techniques for stress management.
• Predict consequences of substance abuse and other addictive behaviors.
• Recognize that mental and emotional health problems can be treated.
• Express basic feelings in a positive way.
Middle School Demonstrators
• Analyze and apply strategies for achieving and maintaining self-esteem.
• Apply interpersonal relationship skills which contribute to emotional wellness.
• Use strategies to manage stress.
• Plan strategies for avoiding substance abuse and other addictive behaviors.
• Investigate methods of prevention, intervention, and treatment of mental and emotional disorders.
Examine and modify nonconstructive expressing of emotions.
High School Demonstrators
• Evaluate methods for prevention, intervention, and treatment of mental and emotional disorders.
• Use prevention and intervention strategies for addictive behaviors.
• Practice interpersonal relationship skills which contribute to emotional wellness.
• Express personal emotions constructively and react to others' emotions appropriately.
Sample Teaching / Assessment Strategies
Collaborative Process
Peer Tutoring, Brainstorming • Community-Based Instruction: Field Studies, Service Learning • Problem Solving: Simulation, Role-play, Interviews, Brainstorming, Inquiry • Whole Language Approach • Writing Process
These sample strategies offer ideas and are not meant to limit teacher resourcefulness. More strategies are found in the resource section.
Ideas for Incorporating Community Resources
• Invite a representative from a mental health agency to discuss mental and emotional disorders and/or ways to express feelings and emotions constructively.
• Invite a mental health expert to demonstrate the value of humor and other techniques for stress management. • Tour a substance abuse treatment facility.
Core Concept – Mental and Emotional Wellness
Sample Elementary Activities
• Make a class Big Book entitled: "Ifs O.K." to illustrate that for every action there is a reaction. Describe a situation on one page, on the next page write "but it's o.k. to..." (e.g., "when my ice cream cone gets knocked out of my hand, ifs o.k. to tell Mom; ask for another cone; feel sad; expect an apology'). OE
• Graph your positive characteristics and strong points. Develop a plan for self-improvement. OE, P
• Identify a situation which causes stress in your classroom; explore and practice ways to relieve the stress constructively. PE, OE, P
• Role-play a "what to do when" game to identify resources of treatment for mental and emotional health problems. PE
• Create a classroom collage of affirmations. PE
• View a television program; define ways emotions were expressed, both verbally and nonverbally, and determine the impact of the expressions on others. Discuss ways nonconstructive expressions might be modified. PE, OE
Applications Across the Curriculum
Language Arts
• Brainstorm ways to deal with stress. Create a bumper sticker to promote stress management. PE, OE
Science
• Develop and implement a plan to complete a science project. Set realistic short-term goals. Report your feelings as goals are met and when project is completed. OE, p
Mathematics
• Keep a mathematics journal (freewriting). Write positive and negative feelings about solving a mathematics problem. OE, p
Social Studies
• Research the elements of physical and emotional health. Produce role-plays to show the correct and incorrect strategies to promote good health. PE
Arts and Humanities
• Create a visual display to help someone change an unhealthy habit or manage stress. Present your work to a civic group and survey their reactions. PE, P
Vocational Education
• Plan and prepare a comic book which illustrates ways to use leisure time. PE, P
• Make a collage using the warning labels from advertisements for alcohol and tobacco products. PE
• Mime various emotions ( e.g., sad, happy, mad). PE
Sample Middle School Activities
• Develop and secretly implement a plan to bolster the self-esteem of someone you care about; keep a journal of your interactions with this individual. Analyze and report on those actions that appeared to be successful and unsuccessful. Discuss how this activity influenced your self-esteem. PE, OE, P
• Implement a three-week plan for changing a negative behavior or habit; use technology to record all progress and setbacks. Make appropriate adjustments for success. P
• Role-play a scenario where you experienced frustration, anger, disappointment, or grief. Identify ways the situation could have been avoided or handled differently. Discuss ways to release the stress of the negative feelings. PE, OE, P
• Use a word processor to draft and revise a letter to Dear Abby asking advice on how to handle a stressful situation in your life. In small groups, reply to a selection of the Dear Abby letters. PE
• Brainstorm situations in which members of the group felt uncomfortable in responding to others' behaviors or requests. Create a skit, rap, cartoon, or song that utilizes refusal skill techniques to respond to peer pressure. PE
Applications Across the Curriculum
Variations on a theme: Peer Pressure
Language Arts
• Read a novel in which peer pressure plays a major factor. p
Science
• Survey changing attitudes of students toward different subject areas and compare across different grade levels. Draw conclusions about the relation of the findings to peer pressure. PE, OE, P
Mathematics
• Design a "peer-pressure survey" about changing attitudes of students toward different subject areas. Compare across different grade levels, and display results as an index. PE, OE
Social Studies
• Examine the motives for cheating on tests and the ways in which these motives relate to peer pressure. OE, p
Arts and Humanities
• Create a collage with peer pressure as the theme. PE
Vocational Education
• Collect and analyze advertisements that use peer pressure as a marketing strategy .PE, OE, P
Reflections
Students' need for mental and emotional wellness parallels their need for physical wellness. In a time when stress, substance abuse, and addictive behaviors are current and well-researched topics in the typical school curriculum, the need for a focus on this academic expectation is already clearly established.
Students who are aware of their own mental and emotional wellness are more likely to consider those factors in their decisions. They must understand their own concerns, actions, and motives for their behavior, if they are to take responsibility for those behaviors and evaluate them for future changes. Their subsequent actions reflect that understanding in positive ways for themselves and others.
Through reflection and collaboration, students learn about themselves, become sensitive to the feelings of others, and learn how their actions and feelings affect others.
Sample High School Activities
• Establish goals for improving and maintaining self-esteem; plan, implement, and record accomplishments. P
• Identify and analyze stressful situations in your life; develop a system for recording management progress. Select and implement a stress management technique (e.g., meditation, playing piano, exercise) for one month. Record and report findings. P
• Interview a graduate from a substance-abuse program; create a case study of his/her drug history , its effects, and the challenges of recovery. Present this case study .PE, OE
• Debate the prohibition of smoking in public areas. PE
• Research automobile accidents where alcohol or drug use was involved; express a personal opinion, in a presentation, about driving while under the influence of alcohol and drugs. PE, OE, P
• Produce a video of a workplace scenario to show how interpersonal skills with customers/clients affect profit and loss in the business world. PE
Applications Across the Curriculum
Language Arts
• Research as a class the issue of teenage suicide by engaging in several of the following activities:
• Read a novel and/or watch a movie that focuses on teenage suicide.
• Interview a psychiatrist who has worked with teenagers who have attempted suicide.
• Spend an evening working on a call-in suicide prevention hotline.
• Read articles and books about teenage suicide.
• Interview parents, or other family members, of teenage suicide victims and/or attend a support group meeting for parents of suicide victims.
• Gather information from other sources as needed.
• Use your research to create a one-hour multimedia program on teenage suicide which your class will present to students during a school assembly. PE, OE, P
Science
• Role-play a doctor who has diagnosed a patient as being HIV positive. Describe to the patient how the disease could have been contracted, the treatments that are available, the short-term and long-term outlook, and possible changes required in his/her lifestyle. PE,OE
Mathematics
• Identify dependent and independent variables in situations involving stress. Prepare a graph from words describing situation. OE
Social Studies
• Use generally accepted norms established by health experts to examine the mental and emotional wellness of a selection of past or present world leaders. OE
Arts and Humanities
• Create plaster masks that convey emotions; use the masks in a conflict-resolution dramatization. PE
Vocational Education • Develop a plan and work with small children to improve their self-esteem skills. PE • Analyze the impact of marketing on self-esteem. OE