Come along for a year-long science-based health class with labs.

This class promises to be much more than the average one-semester health class! Students will participate in a variety of labs, including dissections. As a Texas homeschooling family, this class can be listed on a student's transcript as one credit for lab-based high school science.

Let’s get inspired and fired up to teach our kids how to live healthy lives! Health is about stewardship: managing what you have as well as you can.

The lack of education in Health and the inability to take our health seriously is more than eating too many Oreos or not taking the stairs. We may see our Dr. a few times a year compared to the hundreds of daily decisions that impact our health. What is worse, many of us cannot understand the health advice the doctor is saying or the instructions. If you can’t understand, you will not follow their recommendations. What about being too embarrassed to say that you do not understand?

Or too embarrassed to fully explain what is happening to your body. Don’t we need to teach our kids how to address the medical professionals and advocate for themselves?

So, ask your son or daughter who is really going to care about your health? Who will ultimately be responsible for taking good care of “you?” What better time to teach our kids than now, while they are still home, that one day they will be 100% responsible for their health. How will they do?

If our kids will be their most important health decision-makers “someday,” what are we doing now to prepare them? We need to train them on how to take over the responsibility of their health care.

Public health campaigns try to educate us to make the right decisions on specific issues (smoking, for example). Still, all too often, social media blasts send us much more powerful messages to get us to do what they want.

Who should be responsible for teaching health education?

Parents? Yes, but unfortunately, we may not be health literate ourselves.

Health professionals…YES!

In High School? YES! What about a nurse? YES! Mrs. Shannon Jackson!

Why not teach health in high school from a health professional and view it as every bit as crucial for future success as math and American history.

We are going to teach:

• The importance of individual activities such as strength training, running, biking, and swimming that our young adults can sustain once they graduate and are out in the “real” world.

• We will teach about each body system, how it works, how to keep those systems healthy, and learn about some of the health challenges related to that body system.

• We will also spend time discussing mental and social health and how it impacts todays teens. This will include discussions relating to social media.

• We want to challenge these students to improve one or more areas of their health due to taking this class. This class should not be a waste of their time or your resources.

REQUIRED TEXT: none, reading information and worksheets will be provided by Mrs. Jackson.

But your student should have:

-3 ring binder for keeping handouts, -either notebook paper or a spiral notebook for note taking.

-colored pencils

This class will have homework that will range from reading, studying the parts of a body system, or filling out worksheets. This should take at the most 1-2 hours per week.

There will be occasional projects that students will be responsible for completing at home. These may take a little more time and effort, but should not be overwhelming. Students will be given adequate time for completion.

For mature students.