Courtesy of Becky Lee
Gone are the days of stinky tube socks and being chosen last for kickball. At Grandview Heights, gym and health classes are shifting focus toward a more holistic view of wellness.
Wellness for Life is a K-12 initiative introduced to Grandview Heights Schools in 2014 by then Chief Academic Officer Jamie Lusher that reimagines the curriculum for health, wellness and physical education, says Angela Ullum, the current chief academic officer and head of the Wellness for Life committee. The multifaceted initiative includes a wellness center, food and nutrition services, community partnerships, and wellness-oriented extracurricular activities such as gardening and running clubs.
“The goal of our wellness committee is that we look at all aspects of wellness,” Ullum says. “We just look at it as a system to make sure that we’re all working together to achieve the goal of a whole, healthy child.”
The state of Ohio hasn’t created a health curriculum for public schools, Ullum says. Grandview’s Wellness for Life initiative considers what the district wants Grandview graduates to be able to achieve beyond typical considerations of academic success.
“We thought about the whole child and we wanted to really focus on mental well-being, healthy habits and just really make sure that, when our kids left, they had really strong foundations,” Ullum says.
The 2014 initiative includes teaching attributes such as grit, honesty, accountability and responsibility.
Activities introduced before the pandemic, have rebounded, Ullom says. During Foodie Fridays, students can try a variety of new foods. Salad bars offer a healthy and customizable lunch option throughout the week.
The initiative goes beyond healthy eating, though. Physical education is shifting away from primarily competition and sports-focused activity and embracing student engagement, participation and teamwork, says Kathleen Cress, a health and physical education teacher at Larson Middle School.
“When kids move their body during the day, they’re going to be more focused, they’re going to have more energy, it’s going to help them in other classes in terms of learning,” she says.
Cress, who began teaching at Larson in 2014, says students receive five years of health and wellness classes beginning with the foundations of the health triangle, nutrition and emotional health in fourth grade.
In fifth grade, the district covers the physical, mental and emotional effects of drugs and alcohol use. Sixth grade students learn basic first aid training and CPR.
Seventh grade offers a more thorough unit on nutrition, in addition to another mental health unit that includes suicide prevention. However, Cress says eighth grade covers the biggest unit, with topics on healthy versus unhealthy relationships and sex education. It’s all about offering age-appropriate, holistic programming.
“We try to make the connection of the importance of exercise and mental health,” she says. “I think kids understand that, they know that they’re connected.”
Both young students and administrators have seen the shift in health education throughout the years. Tom Gilbert, a PE teacher at Stevenson Elementary, says there’s definitely been a change in physical education since his school days.
“There’s been a shift from when I was in school, especially in the elementary setting, there weren’t specialists,” he says. “The classroom teacher would take you out to play games with you and they would call it physical education.”
Physical education at the kindergarten, first, second and third grade level still primarily focuses on the basics of movement, body awareness and learning about exercise, Gilbert says.
Movement skills such as running, jumping and skipping are taught early on, while learning how to dribble, kick, throw and catch a ball come later. Students use balloons and paddles to help develop basic hand-eye coordination important in sports such as tennis and racquetball, and jump roping teaches kids about heart health, Gilbert says.
“Kids like to be active,” he says. “That hasn’t changed. Kids want to play, and I think this community lends itself to that too. Kids still have a chance to get out and play.”
Exposing students to a variety of different activities at a young age, such as badminton, yoga, pickleball and roller skating, can help them find healthy activities they enjoy and continue throughout their lives, Cress says.
In fourth and fifth grade, skates are rented for the students through the PTO for a roller-skating unit. Cress says this unit is a great opportunity for some of the students who are less interested in competitive sports to shine and enjoy themselves.
“They are having a ball but I think the teachers are having as much fun,” Ullum says. “They were all roller skating to “Another One Bites the Dust” and the teachers were roller skating with them, so it was a very fun initiative.”
Another program emblematic of the initiative is Grandview Heights’ garden program, which Ullum says was built entirely by students and teachers. The garden is host to fresh produce that’s often included in the schools’ salad bars, but also flowers, shade trees and benches, which Ullum says makes the garden a great place to relax – yet another important practice for a healthy body.
“It is amazing, the work that the students and the teachers do together to make that a place that you can, you know, grow your own food,” she says.
Ullum says students and teachers have been working together on plans to build a new garden once the new building for grades four through eight and the high school building renovations are complete.
Chloe McGowan is an editorial assistant at CityScene Media Group. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
