Kathleen Newton   Course Title: Health/Fitness M Section: 810-1 Objectives: Department: Physical Education Course Title: Health and Personal Fitness Grade Level: 9th Grade Females Objectives • To cover a broad range of topics including areas of mental, physical, and social health. • To provide a non-threatening environment where classmates can discuss sensitive issues pertinent to teenagers today. • To challenge the students to act in keeping with their ethical and moral beliefs. • To provide instruction and strategies to help students evaluate information in order to make wise and healthy lifestyle choices. • To offer an environment where each student can develop a greater sense of self-worth and a realization that they can achieve their goals. • To teach strategies to help students deal with the pressures involved with sexual behavior, and abuse of drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. • To use resources in the community to enhance the learning experience. Methods: Methods Used: This course utilizes a variety of teaching methods. Lecture format is used to introduce chapters and cover factual information. Group discussions offer students many opportunities for sharing ideas with their peers. These discussions often include strategies for dealing with pressures faced by teenagers today. Handouts, group work, and role playing encourage participation by all students. Video presentations, guest speakers, and field trips are used to reinforce the curriculum. One lab day per week gives students the opportunity to engage in physical activity in the form of games, aerobic exercises or fitness assessments. The Girls will dress out on Mondays. Assessment Procedures: Assessment Procedures: Students are evaluated in three areas. Chapter tests and quizzes are given regularly throughout each quarter. This average counts sixty percent toward their quarter grade. Thirty percent of their grade is based on class participation. This includes homework completion, dressing out on lab days, and contributions to class discussions. The final ten percent of the quarter grade is a notebook grade. Each student is required to keep a notebook that includes various handouts, activities, and class notes. Cumulative exams are given each semester. These are counted as one-fifth of the student’s semester average. Enrichment Activities: The health and fitness curriculum is enriched utilizing many resources from the community. Professionals have been invited into our classrooms to share information regarding such topics as sexually transmitted diseases, smoking, drug abuse, cancer, aging, nutrition, eating disorders, coping techniques and stress management. Our speaker agenda is constantly updated. On occasion, field trips are taken to places such as nursing homes, fitness and rehabilitation centers. Resources Used: Resources Used: The textbook used is Lifetime HEALTH , published by Holt, Rinehart and Winston; copyright 2004. Other resources include handouts from the teacher’s supplement package that accompanies the textbook, videos, speakers, and physical fitness tests. Cross-Curricular Connections: The health and fitness course content refers frequently to information that is included in other curriculum areas. Biology, anatomy and physiology, psychology, and physical education are the primary cross curricular connections. English courses also serve as overlapping areas of learning. Reading and writing are necessary components of the health course in completing homework assignments and essay test questions. Content and Pacing: Content and Pacing: The health book consists of twenty one chapters that are covered each year. The amount of time spent on each chapter varies depending on length and content. The material in the book is covered in order and the first ten chapters are completed in the first semester. Chapters 11 through 21. The following is a brief content summary of each chapter from the textbook: • Chapter One introduces students to the concept of wellness and the different areas of health. It stresses the importance of the individual’s daily choices in determining one’s level of wellness. Included are concepts and skills for changing health behaviours for the better. • Chapter Two addresses the concept of self-understanding and how it relates to emotional and mental health. It helps students discover who they are, while examining behaviours that will help them fit into society more successfully. A five step decision making strategy is also learned. • Chapter Three deals with the concepts of human needs, personality development, self-esteem, and peer pressures. It stresses the importance of having our needs met in a constructive rather than a destructive way. • Chapter Four introduces students to the concept of stress, its effects on the body, and ways to reduce it. It emphasizes the importance of dealing with stress effectively to reduce harmful effects to the body. It also gives students some positive ideas for identifying stressors, developing time management skills and using relaxation techniques for coping. • Chapter Five identifies and describes several types of common emotional problems and then suggests possible solutions. Topics covered include addictions, eating disorders, depression, insomnia, anxiety, co-dependency, and problems caused by dysfunctional families, divorce, child abuse and family violence. • Chapter Six. stresses the importance of fitness and provides students with factual information about fitness. Students discover the psychological and physical benefits of physical fitness. Upon conclusion of the chapter each student should be able to set up an individual fitness program. • Chapter Seven introduces students to the nutrients and the ways in which the body uses food to produce energy. It gives them an opportunity to apply this information to their personal nutrition choices. It explores and puts to use knowledge about vitamins, minerals and daily food choices. It introduces the food pyramid and enables students to apply information in a useful and personally beneficial way. It is supplemented with the pyramid.gov online site. • Chapter Eight deals with maintaining ideal weight and having realistic expectations about body size. It equips students with valuable information to make sound decisions concerning weight loss and weight gain programs. • Chapter Nine describes the effects of medicines on the body and their regulatory role of the F.D.A. It stresses the importance of the proper selection and use of medicines • Chapter Ten defines alcohol as the most widely used and abused drug in the U.S. It stresses the impact of alcohol on the judgement center of the brain and the destruction to the rest of the body. It stresses the importance of saying ‘no’ and feeling good about this decision. • Chapter Eleven focuses on tobacco use as a problem of our society. It gives specific details about how smoking affects the smoker’s and non-smoker’s health. The use of smokeless tobacco is also included. It explains why and how a person should quit smoking for a healthier life. • Chapter Twelve. explains the difference between drug use, misuse, and abuse. It addresses how drug abuse might affect student’s future goals. It identifies the drugs of abuse and provides opportunities to practice refusing drugs, tobacco, or alcohol and to protect others from the same. • Chapter Thirteen focuses on the transmission of microbes that cause infectious diseases. The body’s immune system defences are explained and strategies for minimizing individual risks of infection are covered. • Chapter Fourteen introduces students to the concept of relating lifestyle habits to the development or prevention of disease, especially cardiovascular disease. It stresses the importance of knowing the risk factors of lifestyle diseases such as CVD , stroke, cancer and diabetes as well as the alternatives for reducing such risks. • Chapter Fifteen focuses on hereditary diseases, the immune disorders and autoimmune diseases. Understanding disabilities is also covered. • Chapter Sixteen introduces the changes during adolescence, the concept of successful aging and the different aspects of death and dying. . • Chapter Seventeen deals with marriage, parenthood and building healthy families. Parental responsibility and discipline are addressed.. • Chapter Eighteen deals with the reproductive system and its functions, stages of pregnancy, fetal development, the birth process and common birth defects. • Chapter Nineteen deals primarily with the issue of relationships. Dating, abstinence and sexual pressures are topics of discussion. Elements for a successful partnership, stages of a healthy relationship , and dealing with conflict in a constructive manner are also covered. • Chapter Twenty introduces students to some of the most common sexually transmitted diseases, including AIDS. It provides information on the transmission, cause, symptoms, complications, treatments, and preventative actions for each disease. The importance of individual choices regarding abstinence, sexual behaviour, and drug usage in avoiding STDs is addressed. Good communication between partners concerning sexual values, possible infection and limits for sexual contact is discussed. • Chapter Twenty-One deals with the threat of HIV and AIDS in today’s society. Understanding and protecting oneself from HIV and AIDS is strongly introduced. • Other topics addressed include first aid skills and techniques to be used in emergencies. Developing student empathy regarding global environmental issues is stressed throughout the curriculum. Accident and injury prevention is mentioned along with introducing students to key concepts and skills necessary to care for themselves in some life-threatening situations Notes: • The Physical Education Department allows each instructor flexibility in teaching methods, but not course content. Tests are departmental and are given in all sections of the Health Course on the same day.