It Takes 7 Teacher Introductory Notes

Teacher Introductory Notes

Learning intentions

Students understand:

• being healthy involves engaging in a range of healthcare practices
• we practice healthcare every day
• healthcare practice choices can influence how we think, learn and play

Student Engagement

Students:

• identify 7 holistic healthcare practices
• explain why certain healthcare practices are healthy or unhealthy
• choose to engage in a wide range of health promoting behaviours
• enjoy health quizzes, puzzles and activities
• complete personal and class health surveys
• create a personal collage health wheel
• research healthcare practices
• present their findings, with or without technology, making posters, brochures or student/teacher negotiated presentations

Teacher Preparation

Running holistic healthcare units such as It Takes 7 are most effective when the teacher becomes a participant. Once you are familiar with the teaching sequence for students, come back and use this checklist to help you prepare for teaching your health unit. 

Lesson 1: Introduction – be sure you are familiar with the acronymic saying: Attitude is the ANSWER (Air, Nutrition, Sunshine, Water, Exercise, Rest).

Lesson 2: Health Knowledge Quiz – know the answers.

Lesson 3: Personal Health Survey – complete the Adult Health Survey, record your results on a Health Survey Results sheet. Analyse your results and record a plan on a Brainstorm Sheet. List ideas for how you intend to address gaps in your healthcare practices. This preparation will help you model the lesson and co-engage with your students.

Lesson 4: Class Health Quiz – review the survey and see which questions are relevant to your class. The documents can be edited. Consider following up this quiz with a maths activity displaying your findings in graphs. Prepare a lesson to suit your students’ abilities.

Lesson 5: The Health Wheel – experiment with the health wheel tool and be familiar with how to upload and manipulate images. Check the troubleshooting points so you can deal with problems students may encounter when using the interactive tool.

Lesson 6: Research and Investigations – fine tune how you want your unit to unfold. You may like to offer open-ended, limited or specific choices for ongoing healthcare research and investigations. You will need to make decisions about how students will present their assignments and your assessments. You will find examples here for an assessment rubric and student checklist for their assignment tasks. Adapt, personalise, be creative.

Student Sensitivities

It is important to be mindful that some students may have sensitivities regarding their personal health and wellbeing. Concerns in relation to allergies, disabilities, weight perceptions, sporting capabilities, etc may arise in class conversations. Plan ahead for managing these topics. Language choice is critical to alleviating any stigmas students may feel in relation to their size, shape or abilities. A reliable method for managing confronting situations is to shift the students’ focus back to the broad way we look at health. Remind students our healthcare goals are not so much about appearance as vitality, fitness, wellbeing and getting along with others. The aim is to live stronger, healthier more successful lives.

Cross Curriculum Priorities – Sustainability

It is also important for students to contextualise their own healthcare practices in terms of their connections and interactions with natural, managed and built environments, and with people in different social groups within their social networks and wider communities. Considering how these connections and interactions within systems play an important role in promoting, supporting and sustaining the wellbeing of individuals, the community and the environment as a whole, is also importantly juxtaposed with a present and futures perspective.

Students develop their world view by exploring concepts of diversity, social justice and consumerism as these relate to the promotion and maintenance of health and wellbeing. Through movement experiences, students are provided with opportunities to develop a connection in and with environments and to gain an appreciation of the interdependence of the health of people and that of environments.

Download It Takes 7 Teaching Notes and Lesson Teaching Sequence Table