“Open your laptops, instructions are on the board!” announced Health Teacher Sarah Cyr-Mutty to a group of Class 6 students.
After completing a brief wellbeing survey, this early January lesson tasked students with conducting a year in review. They began by watching Google’s three-minute “Year in Search” video.
“That video featured a lot of trends and big moments,” said Ms. Cyr-Mutty at its conclusion. “Are there any that stood out to you or that you would add?” Students noted the absence of major Tik Tok trends, Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour and singer Gracie Abrams’ success, among others.
“Now I want you to think about five key moments from 2024,” their teacher instructed. “Three that happened to you, specifically, and two cultural moments that we all experienced.”
The students energetically chatted with their tablemates about various happenings occurances. Coming back together as a group, the students were asked to share one of their moments, some of which included:
“The 1st goal I scored in soccer after my injury.”
“The concerts I went to!”
“When I broke my arm.”
“The premiere of Wicked!”
Class 6 Health builds on the knowledge, skills and attitudes that students have been developing since Class 4. The goals of this course are to become aware of the different influences on individual health; to demonstrate healthy-decision making (and identify barriers to making such decisions); and to apply effective communication skills to enhance personal and community health.
“Great! Now let’s think about 2025,” Ms. Cyr-Mutty continued. “We’re going to think about changes we might want to make and rank those.”
The students opened the #WinAtSocial platform, created by The Social Institute, to select from the options 1) prioritize mental health, 2) learn something new, 3) get more organized and 4) get more sleep. The Social Institute’s website states that #WinAtSocial is a “gamified, peer-to-peer learning platform, equipping students, educators and families with skills necessary to navigate their social world – in the classroom and beyond, both online and offline – in health high-character ways.”
Ms. Cyr-Mutty underscored that no matter how students ranked these choices, they’re all important and “they’re often related to and benefit one another.” They were also able to see how their rankings compared to those of students all over the world.
The sixth graders finished by writing three steps they could take to succeed in making their number one change and outlining why it is important to them. “Consider what problems you might run into,” Ms. Cyr-Mutty added. “Why might making this change be hard?”
Ms. Cyr-Mutty explained that the students will have check-ins during the spring to evaluate their progress. To conclude, she asked students to share advice for someone whose goal is similar to their own, to which they passionately declared: “Don’t procrastinate” and “Don’t give up!”