Superior kids learn lessons on safety and health
<p>Chuck Bartlebaugh shows students of Superior Elementary School pictures to demonstrate a bear’s habits and the signals they give when encountered in the wild.</p><div><strong> </strong></div>
SUPERIOR – Students at Superior Elementary School got a break from their regular lessons last Wednesday, as they did activities about staying safe during the school’s Health and Safety Day.
The activities were arranged as different stations the students went to over the course of the day. The kids went around to each station in approximately half-hour intervals where presenters from the community and specialty groups spoke to the kids about their subjects.
Many then had an activity to help the kids learn the lessons and get them involved; one station taught the kids a song and dance about washing hands as well as how to cough or sneeze safely. Closer to the end of the period, as time allowed, many also had a question and answer segment; Logan Labbe, principal at Superior Elementary, recalled these sometimes turned into story time as the kids shared their own experiences with the subject.
The stations included proper personal hygiene, Internet safety, building healthy relationships, advice on eating healthy snacks, precautions while in bear territory and proper safety around railroad tracks.
“We have a lot of kids out at bus stops,” said Labbe, of the Bear Aware sessions. “They need to have some kind of Bear Aware information or education.”
He recalled the most popular presentation seemed to be the one for bear safety. The kids learned about how bears act in the wilderness as well as how to recognize signs of a bear’s presence or their signals. They also learned what to do if they encounter a bear and other safety precautions, like how to operate bear spray.
The kids were broken into groups based on their grades with kindergartners in a group with half of the first graders, then the remaining first, second, third and fourth graders were in groups of their own; the fifth and sixth graders were combined to make up a final joint group.
The event was timed to coincide with a scheduled half-day at the school; Labbe noted the teachers were doing professional development later in the day. They decided to hold the Health and Safety Day activities as a fun, but educational, break from everything they have been working on for the last several weeks.
“We’ve been working really hard with our gen ed programs; with our reading and math,” said Labbe. “We hit the ground running right away, week one. It’s the kind of time in the year where ‘hey let’s do something a little different.’ … Sometimes it’s good to take a break and restart the brain.”
A similar event has been held in the past, but this is the first time it has been done in this format. According to Labbe, they have usually had a special lesson centered around hygiene, cleanliness and disease prevention; this pulled kids from regular classroom time, though, so they decided to put everything together and incorporate lessons about safety in the area while focusing on upcoming concerns.
“We thought about the seasons and what’s coming up,” recalled Labbe. “To minimize out-of-class instruction time, why not just take one day.”
There will be another, similar program during the spring term. This one will likely focus more on home safety, fire prevention and camping safety in preparation for the summer.