Grade 2 | HealthSmart

Lesson 1: How Do Families Grow and Change

In this lesson, students consider how families grow and change. They complete an activity sheet to create a “quilt” that shows the shape and size of their families. They compare their quilts to show that families are all unique and special. They discuss good things about being part of a family—how their families help them and how they help their families. Then they review some of the ways families may grow and change through the years and in response to life events. They take home a family sheet to help them discuss ways families help their members be healthy.

Lesson 2: How Do We Grow and Change?

In this lesson, students explore how they have changed and grown physically, emotionally and socially. They compare the things a baby can do to the things second graders can do, and draw things they can do now as a result of growing and changing. They affirm that changes happen both inside and outside and talk about some of the feelings that may accompany growing and changing. They discuss how people grow and change in their own ways and at their own pace and how important it is to accept and respect differences.

Lesson 3: Troublesome Feelings

This lesson helps students think about different kinds of feelings that may be uncomfortable to experience. They listen to stories about kids who are experiencing feelings of sadness, anger, frustration and disappointment and identify behaviors associated with these feelings. They discuss why these feelings can be troublesome, and identify healthy options for dealing with them, including self-management. They learn that troublesome feelings can be signals that they need to get help from a trusted adult.

Lesson 4: Getting Help with Troublesome Feelings

Students continue the discussion of troublesome feelings, with an emphasis on how these feelings are signals that it is time to get help. They examine the concept of support and identify the people they can talk to who can help them deal with troublesome feelings as their personal circle of support. They are introduced to the concept of using I-statements to express strong feelings and practice using this language to ask for help.

Lesson 5: Preventing Colds and Fighting Germs

This lesson teaches about preventing colds and other communicable diseases. Students learn about how germs can cause infections by listening to a story. They view a picture of a classroom to identify all the ways germs could spread, and come up with simple rules that can help prevent the spread of germs. The teacher models the steps for proper handwashing and then students work with a partner to practice. They take home a family sheet to help them discuss preventing colds with their parents or guardians.

Lesson 6: Using Medicines Safely

Students define medicine and discuss different places medicines can come from. They learn the difference between prescription and over-the-counter medicines and identify risks of using medicines improperly. They work as a class to generate rules for using medicines safely and record the rules on an activity sheet to share with their families.

Lesson 7: Healthy Habits

Students define the words healthy habits. They work as a class to review actions that are part of the healthy habits of taking care of teeth, keeping clean, getting enough rest, preventing sun damage, and protecting vision and hearing, and suggest additional strategies to make the practice of the habit more effective. They also discuss rewards and consequences related to the habits and complete activity sheets to summarize their learning.

Lesson 8: Helping Friends Stay Healthy

In this lesson, students learn the steps for advocacy. Then they review what they’ve learned about healthy habits and create a poster campaign to advocate for peers to practice the healthy behaviors of taking care of teeth, keeping clean, getting enough rest, preventing sun damage, and protecting vision and hearing.

Lesson 9: Being Safety Smart on the Street

This lesson introduces the idea of being safety smart. Students discuss how being safe means thinking ahead, review questions they can ask to help them make safety smart choices, and then apply this learning to being safe as a pedestrian. They hear stories about kids who are faced with decisions about safety while walking or crossing the street and determine what the safety smart choice would be in each situation. They examine why these actions are safety smart, discuss how different emotions and circumstances can affect decisions about street safety, and complete an activity sheet to summarize street smart actions.

Lesson 10: Being Safety Smart as a Passenger

This lesson reviews how to be safe when riding in a car or other vehicle. Students review the safety smart questions, then hear stories about kids who are faced with decisions about safety while riding in a car and on a bus and determine what the safety smart choice would be in each situation. They examine why these actions are safety smart, discuss how different emotions and circumstances can affect decisions about passenger safety, and complete an activity sheet to summarize passenger smart actions.

Lesson 11: Being Safety Smart Around Water

This lesson explores how to be safe around water. After discussing the qualities of water that can make it both fun and potentially dangerous, students hear stories about kids who are faced with decisions about safety around water and determine what the safety smart choice would be in each situation. They examine why these actions are safety smart, discuss how different emotions and circumstances can affect decisions about water safety, and complete an activity sheet to summarize water smart actions.

Lesson 12: Being Safety Smart When You Ride a Bike

In this lesson students learn important rules for being safe when riding a bicycle or other wheeled equipment. They discuss the importance of always wearing a helmet or other protective gear, review the criteria for being sure a helmet fits and is worn correctly, and identify other actions that can help keep them safe when they are on a bike, skateboard or skates. They complete an activity sheet to summarize bike smart actions.

Lesson 13: Setting a Goal to Be Safety Smart

In this lesson, students review the different safety smart actions they’ve been learning. They create a safety smart rule book featuring their safety smart activity sheets. Then they learn some simple steps for goal setting and choose a safety smart behavior they intend to practice.

Lesson 14: What We Know About Bullying

In this lesson, students learn about bullying. They explore what bullies might do or say and why these things are wrong and not OK. They talk about how targets of bullying feel and receive the message that everyone deserves to be respected and feel safe at school. They identify people they could ask for help with a bullying situation, and identify actions bystanders to bullying can take to help.

Lesson 15: Taking a Stand Against Bullying

In this lesson, students plan an anti-bullying campaign. They review why bullying is wrong and make and wear badges to help share what they’ve learned with others. They also take home a family sheet to help them talk about bullying with their parents or guardians.

Lesson 16: Drinking Water to Be Healthy

This lesson explains the importance of water for health. Students identify different beverage choices and learn which are healthiest. They discuss all the different ways and times they can drink water when they are thirsty, then practice asking for water when they are given a choice of what to drink. They complete an activity sheet to picture the health benefits of drinking water and encourage their peers to drink more water.

Lesson 17: Eating a Healthy Breakfast

This lesson teaches the importance of a healthy breakfast. Students learn why breakfast is an important meal and how it contributes to good health. They identify guidelines for choosing healthy breakfast foods and ways to identify foods that are less healthy choices. They examine their own breakfast preferences and illustrate some healthy breakfast food choices.

Lesson 18: Fruits and Vegetables Are Healthy Snacks

This lesson presents the concept of 5 a day and focuses on eating fruits and vegetables as healthy snacks. Students identify a variety of different fruits and vegetables, then interpret the 5-a-day message. They share the names of their favorites and create a drawing to share and explain their choices to others. Then they discuss what snacks are, identify qualities of healthy and less-healthy snacks, and review the benefits of eating fruits and vegetables as snacks. They create a collage of snack choices and categorize these as healthy or less healthy. They take home a family sheet to help them talk about fruit and vegetable favorites with their parents or guardians, and take home a mini-poster to remind them to choose fruits and vegetables as healthy snacks.

Lesson 19: Setting a Goal to Eat 5 a Day

In this lesson, students set a goal to eat 5 fruits and vegetables a day. They learn some simple steps for setting a goal, receive a tracking sheet to keep track of their fruit and vegetable intake for a week, and discuss who can help them meet their 5-a-day goal.

Lesson 20: Liking and Moving Your Body

This lesson helps build a positive body image and introduces the healthy behavior of being active every day. Students view a picture and discuss how kids come in all shapes and sizes, then identify qualities about themselves that they like and feel proud of. They discuss the importance of physical activity for health, and explore things they can do to be active to reach the recommended amount for children their age of 60 minutes of activity per day. They illustrate three ways they like to move their bodies and write a short story about why they like their bodies to accompany the drawings. They put their individual work together to create a classroom book about their great moving bodies to inspire others to move too.

Lesson 21: Setting a Goal to Move 60 a Day

In this lesson, students set a goal to be active for 60 minutes a day. They explore the benefits of being physically active and identify key rewards for themselves. Then they review the steps for setting a goal, and discuss who can help them meet their activity goal.

Lesson 22: Stretching My Body

This lesson promotes stretching as a form of physical activity that can help keep the body healthy. Students discuss benefits of stretching, then they learn and practice some simple stretches, led by the teacher. They continue to practice the stretching routine throughout the week. They take home a family sheet to help them discuss stretching with their parents or guardians.

Lesson 23: Dangers of Tobacco

In this lesson, students review the different ways tobacco and its smoke can hurt the body. They identify different forms of tobacco, including smokeless tobacco, and discuss how they know when someone has been smoking. The teacher presents a poem to explain the dangers of both smoking and smokeless tobacco use. Then students compose a letter to a friend explaining why tobacco use is harmful.

Lesson 24: Using Tobacco Can Become Addicting

This lesson introduces the concepts of experimentation and addiction in relation to tobacco use. Students hear a story about Bob, an adult who smokes, as a way to understand how experimentation with tobacco can lead to addiction and many years of use. They discuss what addiction means and how it can feel to care about someone who is addicted to tobacco. They review how important it is to avoid secondhand smoke whenever possible, and take home a family sheet to help them talk about tobacco with their parents or guardians.

Lesson 25: Getting Support to Be Tobacco Free

This lesson explores how students can get support for being tobacco free. They explore how the people in their lives can help them do healthy things, then complete a signature sheet to gather support from specific people they think can help them stay tobacco free. They post their completed sheets and share how these people can help them, then celebrate that they have these support systems for making healthy choices about tobacco.

Lesson 26: Making the Choice to Be Tobacco Free

This lesson helps students express a personal choice to be tobacco free. After reviewing some everyday choices they make for themselves, students consider what their choice about tobacco will be. They learn questions to ask themselves when making a choice and answer these questions in relation to tobacco use. They explore the meaning of making a pledge, then create personal pledge strips to join into a chain. They display their classroom chain in support of being tobacco free to encourage other students at their school to commit to being tobacco free too.

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