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Health Education 
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The Boulder Valley School District Health Education Program provides comprehensive, skills-based, age appropriate classroom instruction that addresses the physical, mental, emotional and social dimensions of health.  It is designed to motivate and assist students to maintain and improve their health, prevent disease and reduce health-related risk behaviors both while in school, and throughout their lives.

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Click on "Current Events and Announcements" in the left column of this webpage to find out about the latest conferences, classes and other health-related events.

 How Health Education is Delivered in BVSD

What Health Curriculum and Standards are Taught in BVSD?

Since no Health Education standards have been adopted in Colorado, BVSD adopted the National Health Education standards in 2004 to serve as the foundation in developing a K-12 comprehensive health education curriculum.  The Health curriculum is grounded in the bodies of both sound education and public health research, framed by health behavior theory and was developed over three years through an extensive community-input process. 

BVSD's curriculum teaches skills through standards 2-7: 

  • how to effectively access resources,
  • practice healthy behaviors,
  • analyze personal and societal influences,
  • communicate effectively about health issues,
  • set goals and make health-related decisions, and
  • advocate for self, family, friends and community. 

Through these skills, students acquire functional health knowledge (standard 1) about:

  • mental and emotional health,
  • violence awareness,
  • substance prevention,
  • human growth and development and human sexuality,
  • nutrition and fitness,
  • disease prevention,
  • diversity awareness,
  • injury prevention and safety and more.
     

For more information about BVSD's Health Education standards, click on the following link: http://bvsd.org/healthed/Pages/skillsbasedrationale.aspx

 

 Who Teaches Health Education?

  • Secondary Health teachers are asked to have a minimum of 90 hours of professional development in Health Education.
  • 5th grade classroom teachers receive mandatory training before teaching the puberty unit.


 When is Health Education Taught in BVSD?

Secondary:

  • one quarter in 7th grade,
  • one quarter in 8th grade
  • one semester in 10th grades 

Elementary:
No delivery time has been allocated for the elementary level with the exception of a short unit on human growth and development in the 5th grade (with a focus on physical, emotional, mental and social changes during puberty).

 What Materials are Utilized to Teach the Curriculum?

    Learning materials adopted to assist teachers in teaching the Health curriculum include:

    Secondary:

    • Health Promotion Wave, Grades 6 - 12 (in English and Spanish)
    • Our Whole Lives Sexuality Education Grades 7 - 9
    • Our Whole Lives Sexuality Education Grades 10 - 12
    • Everyone Counts: A Resource Guide on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Issues for Middle School Administrators and Teachers.
    • Everyone Counts: A Resource Guide on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Issues for High School Administrators and Teachers.

    Elementary:

    • Since no delivery time has been allocated to Health at the elementary level, no learning materials have been adopted and purchased with the exception materials used in teaching the human growth and development unit:
    • Health Promotion Wave, Grade 5 Puberty Kit (in English and Spanish)

 How Does Health Education Coordinate with Other Health-related Efforts?

Consistent with best practice protocol, BVSD’s Health Education Program works collaboratively with the seven other Coordinated School Health (CSH) component areas to ensure all students achieve academically by increasing learning capacity and reducing absenteeism.  To learn more about this initiative, go to:http://bvsd.org/csh/Pages/default.aspx