Health Teacher Rachel Lupone and a group of her Health 2 students have been working together to help break the stigma around mental health for the younger kids. Mrs. Lupone said, “I realized along with my students how important it is to educate the younger population at Joel on mental health and different skills that they can utilize to combat stress and or stressful situations”
Husky Health Day is a day dedicated to the third and fourth graders at Lewin G Joel Elementary School. The group of Health 2 students will teach the students about what stress is, the factors that cause it, and the tools to manage it.
The Morgan students created five stations for the students to visit.
The five stations consist of:
- Gratitude Activities (Gratitude journaling, Writing thank-you notes, Creating a gratitude jar)
- Physical Exercise (Yoga, Dance parties, Outdoor games)
- Skits (Healthy/Unhealthy scenarios; problem-solving, conflict resolution)
- Mindfulness Activities (breathing, meditation, coloring)
- Self-Care Chart (ways you can take care of yourself; mentally and physically)
Juniors Jason Mansfield, Gabi Navarra, Katie Nguyen, and Nina Fishman are in charge of this project. The four of them with Mrs. Lupone presented this idea, with a well-thought-out slideshow, to Principal Keri Hagness to get her support and approval.
After getting the approval from Mrs. Hagness, the students will contact school therapists at Joel, and their principals to work out a day, hopefully next semester, to fulfill their goal of helping the elementary kids understand the importance of mental health.
Since Joel does not have a formal health education class, the students are not exposed to what mental health is or even how to deal with their emotions. Kids need to be educated about mental health and healthy ways to cope.
I, Gabi, hope our project will break the stigma around mental health, especially for the boys who may believe only girls can have emotions. I want to show how everyone deals with emotions of their own, and it’s important to talk about them to people instead of holding them inside and ignoring feelings.
Jason hopes “to teach the kids about mental health and how it can affect you, and how to deal with it so when something in the future comes up, you’re prepared to help resolve it.” Mrs. Hagness absolutely loved the idea and the message we hope to provide to the younger kids.
Mrs. Lupone’s goal for this idea is “to really make strong connections between our high school kids and the elementary students because I think there’s so much opportunity to make an impact on the younger generation, I also hope to have my high school students to take the lead with this project”
If this Joel School assembly is a success, Mrs. Lupone hopes for it “to become a legacy here at Morgan” as well.