Elementary School Wellness Education With HKPropel Access

Health education and physical education are traditionally siloed—for no good reason, according to authors Matthew Cummiskey and Frances Cleland Donnelly.

So, through Elementary School Wellness Education, the two authors provide a blueprint, complete with lesson plans, for teachers to fuse health education and physical education into one elementary school class.

“Students should be educated in a more holistic manner,” says Cummiskey. “We applied the concept of school wellness education at the elementary level, which has components of both traditional health education and physical education.”

Elementary School Wellness Education offers the following:

• 37 detailed lesson plans for grades K-5 (19 lessons for K-2 and 18 lessons for grades 3-5) that are tied to SHAPE America Outcomes and National Health Education Performance Indicators
• Clear instruction on how to apply the plans, making it perfect for both preservice and in-service teachers
• More than 70 lesson plan handouts (with four-color graphics), available in the HKPropel platform, that are easy for teachers to print
• A test package, presentation package, and instructor guide that make this ideal for existing and emerging teacher education courses

A typical School Wellness Education (SWE) lesson combines classroom-based learning activities—such as discussions, worksheets, and videos—with physical activity. All the lessons in the book take place in the gymnasium, so there’s no need for a separate health education classroom. In addition, the SWE approach helps teachers maximize their instruction time by meeting multiple learning standards simultaneously.

“The lessons are learning focused, with each activity carefully aligned to the objectives,” says Cleland Donnelly. “Moreover, they’re fun. Students aren’t sitting in a traditional classroom learning health; they’re doing it in the gym.” SWE also uses traditional PE equipment—and the gym—in new and creative ways, she adds. “This is especially important in schools that lack a separate health education classroom.”

Elementary School Wellness Education addresses emergent pedagogies such as skill-based education, universal design for learning, social and emotional learning, and social justice, helping both in-service and preservice teachers understand how to use and benefit from these pedagogical approaches. It also guides readers in how to teach wellness education online as effectively as face-to-face. Teachers will learn how to teach the content in person, online, or in a hybrid approach.

“The good news for teachers is that SWE is not a dramatic departure from existing instruction,” says Cummiskey. “Students are still moving and being taught in the gymnasium, but now health content and skills are being infused into all the lessons.”

The book, he says, is also suitable for use by classroom teachers looking to promote wellness or incorporate additional physical activity into their students’ days. “The intent is to imbue students with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions to lead a healthy life into and through adulthood,” he says.

Note: A code for accessing HKPropel is included with all new print books.

 

Audience

Elementary health or physical education specialists, health or PE administrators, elementary classroom teachers, and undergraduate teacher education majors (PETE, HETE, and elementary education)

Part I. Introduction to School Wellness Education

Chapter 1. The School Wellness Approach
Making the Case for School Wellness Education
Benefits of School Wellness Education
Challenges Confronting School Wellness Education
The Journey Here
Vision for School Wellness Education
School Wellness Education in the Classroom
Summary

Chapter 2. Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child Model
WSCC Components
Implementing the WSCC Model
WSCC in Action
Summary

Chapter 3. Emergent Education Pedagogies
Developmental Characteristics of the K-5 Learner
Universal Design for Learning
Social Justice in Elementary School Wellness Education
Skills-Based Pedagogical Approach and Active Learning
Summary

Chapter 4. Online School Wellness Education
Growth of Online Education
Challenges of Online Education
Advantages of Online Education
Instructional Prerequisites
Core Communication Infrastructure
Planning and Pedagogy
Wellness Instructional Strategies
Assessing Online Learning
Summary

Part II. Lesson Plans

Chapter 5. Lesson Plans for Grades K-2
Calling 9-1-1, Listening, and Locomotor Skills
Changing Families, Body Parts, Balance, Shapes, and Levels
Dimensions of Wellness and Balance
Fire Safety, Weight Transfer, Rolling, and Locomotor Skills
Getting Enough Sleep and Body Actions
Goals, Directions, and Pathways
Handwashing, Overhand Throw, and Locomotor Skills
Hazardous Household Products, Locomotor Skills, and Instep Kick
Healthy Relationships and Dribbling With Feet
Hydration and Dribbling With Hands
Living Smoke Free: Jumping, Leaping, and Striking
Managing Troublesome Feelings, Seeking Help, and Overhand Throw
Medicine Safety, Underhand Throw, and Space
Peer Pressure, Mirror and Match, and Speed
Recycling, Underhand Toss, and Striking
Respiratory System and Underhand Roll
Secondhand Smoke and Locomotor Skills
Senses, Trust, and Dribbling
Sneezing, Coughing, Cooperation, and Fundamental Movement Skills

Chapter 6. Lesson Plans for Grades 3-5
Asthma and Fielding Game Skills
Brushing Teeth and Hockey Pass and Receive
Cardiovascular System and Movement Skills
Conflict Resolution and Manipulative Skills
Decision-Making and Assertiveness
Digestive System and Underhand Throw
Endocrine System, Hygiene, and Striking in Golf
Flossing Teeth and Basketball Dribbling
Food Labels and Soccer Dribbling
Healthy Eating and Striking
Immune System, Open Space, and Person-to-Person Defense
Inclusion and Batting
Muscular System and Fitness
Peer Pressure
Physical Activity Pyramid, Goal Setting, and Yard Games
Skeletal System and Fitness
Stress, Coordination, and Heart Rate
Valid Health Information and Body Weight Fitness

Matthew Cummiskey, PhD, is an associate professor at West Chester University (WCU) in West Chester, Pennsylvania, where he trains future school wellness educators. He taught K-12 health and physical education for five years and has taught within higher education for 13 years. Dr. Cummiskey helped develop the wellness-centric teacher education program at WCU in collaboration with Dr. Frances Cleland Donnelly. He is codirector of the WCU adventure education program.  He is the editor for the SHAPE Pennsylvania journal and the Mid-Atlantic adventure education journal.  Dr. Cummiskey has formed collaborations with the School District of Philadelphia to promote quality urban wellness education.  He has numerous articles and conference presentations to his credit. Dr. Cummiskey enjoys implementing technology in his classes. He contributed a chapter to Technology for Physical Educators, Health Educators, and Coaches, published in 2021 by Human Kinetics.

Frances Cleland Donnelly, PED, is a professor in the department of kinesiology at West Chester University. She served on the SHAPE America’s board of directors (2016-2019) and is a former president of SHAPE America (2017-2018). Dr. Cleland has also been president of the National Association for Sport and Physical Education and SHAPE Pennsylvania. Cleland Donnelly has numerous articles in refereed publications and chapters in books to her credit. She has made many dozens of presentations at the international, national, district, and state levels. In 2020 she received the SHAPE America Eastern District Tilia Fantasia Service Award, and in 2016 she was awarded the SHAPE America Margie R. Hanson Elementary Physical Education Distinguished Service Award. In 2014, she was inducted into the North American Society of HPERSD Professionals, and she has received numerous awards for teaching and service throughout her career. She was the lead author on Developmental Physical Education for All Children, Fifth Edition, published in 2017 by Human Kinetics.

Conflict Resolution and Manipulative Skills
Social Justice in Elementary School Wellness Education
The School Wellness Approach

All ancillaries are free to adopting instructors through HKPropel.

Instructor guide. Includes big ideas, objectives, lecture topics, and teaching activities.

Test package. Contains questions in true-false, fill-in-the-blank, essay and short-answer, and multiple-choice formats. The files may be downloaded for integration with a learning management system or printed for use as paper-based tests. Instructors may also create their own customized quizzes or tests from the test bank questions to assign to students directly through HKPropel.

Presentation package. Features more than 60 PowerPoint slides that can be used for class discussion and presentation. The slides in the presentation package can be used directly within PowerPoint or printed to make handouts for students. Instructors can easily add, modify, and rearrange the order of the slides.

Instructors also receive access to all lesson plan materials in HKPropel. For Elementary School Wellness Education, this includes more than 70 resource handouts (with four-color graphics) that can easily be printed.