Suggested Learning Activities The following suggested activities comply with education standards for Grades 5-8. Educators and prevention specialists gathered to develop activities appropriate for the Clear Minds Clear Messages campaign, which have been in turn adapted for use in Kentucky. The National Education Association and the National Office of Drug Control Policy have also developed standards-based classroom activities, which offer ways to easily integrate prevention activities into classrooms. These classroom activities are promoted by the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign to incorporate drug prevention information into education plans. The following activities are a culmination of these developed activities and curricula. Additional activities may be found at many of the websites in the resources portion of this handbook. The suggested classroom activities are not an alcohol, drug or violence prevention education curriculum, but offer a variety of ways to easily integrate prevention activities into different subject areas. These activities incorporate the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign s four critical prevention messages as learning objectives: Normative Education educating youth that most young people do not use drugs. Negative Consequences educating youth about the risks of using of alcohol and drugs and that this usage may likely lead to a variety of negative consequences. Positive Consequences educating youth that a drug-free lifestyle will most likely result in valued benefits. Resistance Skills instructing and encouraging personal and social skills that promote healthy lifestyle choices and resistance to alcohol and drug use (http://www.theantidrug.com/teachersguide/more.html). The suggested activities utilize proven effective prevention principles. Most of the activities require a high level of student involvement and hands-on participation. They also encourage critical thinking and life skills development. The service learning activities provide opportunities for students to share anti-drug messages with others. English Language Arts These suggested activities are designed to develop language skills for information and understanding, for critical analysis and evaluation, and language for social interaction. This is a recommended curriculum that enables teachers to meet many of the existing objectives in the language arts curriculum, while focusing on the topic of substance abuse prevention. This is an exciting way for students to learn about language arts through practical application of their skills. It is suggested that each activity be prefaced with students reading written information about alcohol and drugs, collecting factual data, reviewing multimedia materials, listening to professionals and presenters involved in the prevention field, discussing their personal experiences with peer and societal pressures, and discussing their views regarding substance use and abuse.
Activity 1 - Draw three columns on the board with the headings: Negative Consequences, Positive Consequences and Resistance Skills. Ask the students what they already know about the dangers of alcohol, tobacco, marijuana and/or other drugs. List all the negative consequences that the students can offer. Supplement the student s responses with factual information (see Internet Resources, pages 24-25). Then ask students to identify the positive consequences of staying drug-free. List these under Positive Consequences. Then ask students to identify different ways they can resist peer or societal pressure to use drugs. Encourage the students to brainstorm ideas, and consider inviting an older youth to join the brainstorming session. Service Learning Opportunity: Have the students do the same exercise with younger students. Activity 2 - Encourage youth to develop television public service announcements (PSA) that market positive health behavior messages related to not using alcohol, tobacco and other drugs. Encourage youth to view many television PSAs to learn more about media marketing. Consider inviting a radio or television professional to present to your class or group. Instruct students to select a target audience for their media message. Brainstorm effective marketing strategies for the selected audience in order to best deliver the PSA message. Encourage youth to create an outline for the content of their public service announcement in order to write a clear, concise marketing message. Record the created public service announcements on audio or videotape. Share the created media message with others and receive critical feedback. Service Learning Opportunity: Have students present their public service announcements with an explanation of their learning experience to a local community group or civic organization. Activity 3 - Explain to students that they are to write a letter to a friend who has a concern about marijuana. The letter should include factual information about the negative consequences of marijuana use, positive consequences of not using this drug, and advise to the friend about resisting pressures to use marijuana. Divide the class into groups and have the students share their letters. Guide the students to combine the strongest parts of all the letters to create one new letter. Present and/or display each group s letter to share and reinforce the anti-drug messages with others (see http://www.theantidrug.com/teachersguide/activities_antidrugadvise.html for more delineation of this activity and to obtain developed student worksheets and suggested resources). Activity 4 - Encourage youth to write a newspaper editorial about local alcohol and drug use, and the dangers related to this use. Review different newspapers to gain knowledge about editorials and their format. Consider inviting a local news reporter to your class to share with the students. Ask students to talk with peers and gain information about alcohol and drug use of local youth. Have the students research the Internet for newspaper editorials regarding the dangers of alcohol and drug use. Instruct the students to select a target audience. Print the students written editorials, distribute to peers and perhaps even submit to school newspapers, PTA newsletters, and/or local newspapers. Service Learning Opportunity: Students visit an after-school program and assist younger students with cutting out advertisements about cigarettes. Provide an anti-smoking message to these younger youth. Activity 5 - Guide students to create website designs. Have the students review many website designs either in school or at home, especially those focused on alcohol and drug abuse. Encourage the students to select a target population and create a website design appropriate for that population.
Fine Arts The suggested activities for Fine Arts enable teachers to meet many of the existing objectives in their visual arts curriculum, while incorporating the topic of alcohol and drug abuse prevention. It is suggested that each activity be prefaced with students reading written information about alcohol and drugs, collecting factual data, reviewing multimedia materials, listening to professionals and presenters involved in the prevention field, discussing their personal experiences with peer and societal pressures, and sharing their views regarding substance use and abuse. Activity 1 - Inform students that they will create anti-drug messages (poster designs, t-shirt designs, and websites). Introduce the activity by discussing that the general public is greatly influenced by the media. Explain that many advertising strategies are designed to sell a product or service, while other strategies are created to send a particular message. Review and collect examples of print advertisements that encourage the selling of a product or service and those that send a message. Then review advertisements that send anti-drug messages. Discuss elements of persuasive communication and its effect upon people. Explain that it is the students assignment to create a print advertisement that sends a message about the danger of drug use, ways to help prevent drug use among young people, as well as the positive consequences for remaining drug-free. Once the students have created their print advertisements, have them share them with each other, with other classes or groups, and even present to community groups. (Consult http://www.theantidrug.com/teachersguide/activities_psa.html for further delineated instructions, to obtain already developed student workshops and suggested resources to provide you with information for this activity). Service Learning Opportunity: Make and post anti-drug posters throughout local community. Activity 2 - Instruct students that they will create t-shirt designs declaring My anti-drug. Have the students review the http://freevibe.com website to learn more about the My anti-drug Campaign. This website is a popular youth-oriented drug prevention website which provides drug facts and information to help young people understand the real and serious consequences of drug use. The site includes a searchable fact-based drug information database and pertinent Internet links. It was produced by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) and is the flagship website for youth outreach as part of the integrated national Anti-Drug Media Campaign. Encourage the students to enter the hobby, person, passion or interest that keeps them away from drugs. Consider having the students draw their design onto T-shirts with fabric marker or paint, or via iron-on transfers. Service Learning Opportunity: Students visit a retirement center and share their chosen My Anti- Drug with a senior citizen. Describe their learning activity to them. Activity 3 - Instruct students that they will collectively create a mural that illustrates Healthy Choices and Lifestyles vs. Alcohol and Drug Use. Review many murals to become familiar with this art form. Study the different mediums used to create murals. Select an actual site where the mural might be created (even if the mural will not be painted at that site). Discuss the limitations and the positive features of this site (difficulty obtaining community approval, good community exposure, art safety issues, artist exposure, etc). Encourage the students to select a target audience and create an appropriate design. Have the students create a plan for their interactions, agreeing on a design for the mural, and the actual painting of the mural. Support the students as they actually paint the mural (on large sheets of white paper taped to a class wall or hall, or perhaps your facility would allow the mural to be actually painted on a wall). Have the students discuss their experiences and what they learned. Share the mural through pictures, including in school newspapers and/or newspaper coverage.
Health The learning objectives of the following suggested activities include Normative Education and the learning of resistance skills. The activities will help young people understand the social norms theory and how it applies to their lives. It will raise awareness about certain behaviors and help encourage young people to live well. It is suggested that each activity be prefaced with students reading written information about alcohol and drugs, collecting factual data, reviewing multimedia materials, listening to professionals and presenters involved in the prevention field, discussing their personal experiences with peer and societal pressures, and sharing their views regarding substance use and abuse. Activity 1 - Instruct students that they will develop a class survey about healthy and high-risk behaviors. Draw two columns on the board with the headings Healthy Behaviors and High-Risk Behaviors. Encourage the students to brainstorm, identifying healthy and risky behaviors and attitudes. List these under the appropriate columns. Guide the students to choose one or two of these behaviors that are related to violence, or drug and alcohol use, for their survey. The teacher/adult facilitator then should formulate the survey questions based upon the subject behaviors or attitudes that the youth selected. Phrase the survey questions appropriately so as to be sensitive to and consistent with school policies. The survey questions should be arranged in pairs, for example: How many times did you drink alcohol last month? How many times do you think other students in this class/team/school drank alcohol last month? Do you think smoking cigarettes makes a person look cool? Do you think your classmates think smoking cigarettes makes a person look cool? Distribute the survey to your students. Assure students that this is an anonymous survey and encourage them to answer honestly so that their results are valid. Provide every student with a pencil so that all the surveys look the same when completed. Have students answer the questions and deposit their surveys in a box. The facilitator shuffles the surveys and redistributes one to each student. The facilitator then reads the questions and asks for a show of hands for each possible answer on the survey students are holding. The results are tallied on the blackboard. Review the discrepancy between actual and perceived substance use. Instruct students about Normative Education or Social Norms Theory. (Activity developed by Alan Berkowitz, PHD) Activity 2 - Inform the students that they will create a puppet show to display resistance strategies (behaviors) to avoid being pressured to use harmful drugs, such as huff inhalants. Research, collect, and review information about inhalants. List the Negative Consequences of inhalants, and the Positive Consequences of not using this drug. Encourage the students to brainstorm Resistance Strategies for not using inhalants when pressured by peers. Discuss the various resistance strategies suggested by the national Anti-Media Drug Campaign: Walk away/leave, give an excuse or a reason, make a joke, hang with others who choose not to use, avoid possible problem situation, say no and repeat it. Discuss that it is important for youth to be prepared for situations where they feel pressured to use any kind of illegal substance. Being prepared means thinking ahead and repeatedly practicing resistance skills before the situation arises in a social situation: change the subject, ignore it, offer an alternative. Divide the students into groups. Have each group create a script for their puppet show, reminding the students that the goal is to demonstrate resistance skills. Provide the students with art supplies to create puppets, props and scenery. Have each group perform their puppet show for the rest of the class. Discuss the many
resistance strategies demonstrated. (Check out this website, http://www.theantidrug.com/teachersguide/activities_puppet.html for teachers guide, student worksheets and suggested resources information). Service Learning Opportunity: Perform puppet shows with anti-drug messages to younger students. Mathematics This activity allows the instructor to meet many of the existing objectives in the grades 5-8 mathematics curriculum utilizing enjoyable activities providing alcohol and drug awareness and prevention information. It is suggested that each activity be prefaced with students reading written information about alcohol and drugs, collecting factual data, reviewing multimedia materials, listening to professionals and presenters involved in the prevention field, discussing their personal experiences with peer and societal pressures, and sharing their views regarding substance use and abuse. Activity 1 - Instruct students to use national and local data to understand and use numbers in a variety of equivalent forms to convey information about alcohol, tobacco and other drug use/nonuse. Students can use the information to multiply and divide three digit numbers and convert fractions into decimals and percentages. The percentage can then be used to represent a statement in one of two ways, depending on what the type of message is to be conveyed. For example, if students wanted to emphasize how many teens use tobacco, they would want to present a statistic using a statement such as this: 5% of 7 th graders in Kentucky smoke cigarettes. However, if you wanted to emphasize the positive health behaviors of teens not using tobacco they would want to present a statistic using a statement such as this: 95% of 7 th graders in Kentucky choose not to use tobacco! OR most Kentucky teens (95%) choose not to use tobacco!
Suggested Activities for Grades K-4 Many of the suggested activities for elementary youth use a Just Say NO approach to prevention. The Just Say NO approach to prevention has been shown to be effective with elementary-age students. The suggested activities for elementary youth focus on the dangers and risks associated with alcohol and drug use. This approach has been more effective with elementary age youth because they are more concrete thinkers. Thus, the damage alcohol and drug abuse causes is a good reason not to experiment with guns or alcohol/drugs. As children age, other factors become more important, older youth are able to justify and rationalize why the dangers and risks associated with alcohol, drug and gun use are not as important as fitting-in, reducing stress, and feeling better. As youth age, dangers and risks associated with a substance are often perceived as scare tactics. Thus, the Just Say No approach is not suggested for middle school-aged or older youth. Art Collages Draw pictures or cut up old magazines to make a collage that tells about all the cool things young people can do when they choose not to use alcohol, tobacco and other drugs. Find pictures of people playing their favorite sport, running fast and doing other healthy activities. Language Arts Journal Writing Write down some of the things that make you feel good about yourself. Include things that make you proud your good qualities, your accomplishments, and things you do well. Do the things on your list help you say no to harmful substances? Are there things on the list that would be harder to accomplish if you used alcohol, tobacco or other drugs? Mathematics 1. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that each smoked cigarette takes seven minutes from a smoker s life. Calculate the number of years already lost by an 18 yearold who has been smoking a half a pack per day, for a year. What about for two years? What about smoking just five cigarettes a day since age fourteen? Do you know a person over the age of ninety? Has that person ever smoked? 2. Calculate the amount of money spent per month by a person who smokes half a pack of cigarettes a day if the average cost of a pack of cigarettes is $5.00. Use other figures such as a pack a day, two packs a day for a month, a year, ten years, etc. What are some other ways youth could spend that money? Do they think the cost of cigarettes will keep going up? Forty years ago, a carton of cigarettes cost less than a pack does now. Advertising Have youth collect cigarette ads from magazines and examine the images in the ads. What are the advertisers trying to trick you into believing are the good things about smoking? Do the models look young and healthy? Are they glamorous or athletic? Do these images fit in with what the students know about the effects of smoking? Explain the tobacco companies claim they don t target young people. Ask students if they think these claims are true. Put all your ads together and make a collage or mural. Source: Girl Scout Council of Central New York, Inc