Standard 7, planning instruction. A teacher must be able to plan and manage instruction based upon knowledge of subject matter, students, the community, and curriculum goals.

Below, two lessons present the importance of physical exercise to heart health for young learners.  To take these lessons one step further, a half-hour physical education gym class could be created for the second graders to get them moving!  after class children could take their pulse.

Elementary Health Class

Heart Health and Exercise: An Introduction

Age: Second grade

National Standard:  Student will comprehend concepts related to health promotion and disease prevention to enhance health.

Objective: Students will be able to describe what the their heart does when they are physically active.

Materials:

·      How a Normal Heart Pumps Blood YouTube video:

·      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JA0Wb3gc4mE

·      Poster: Why is Physical Activity Important?

Teaching Strategies & Procedures:

Attention-getter: “Put your hand on your heart!”

·      Where is your heart located? 

·      Your heart is in the middle of your chest, tipped slightly to the left.

Assess background knowledge briefly & introduce lesson:

·      What does your heart do?

·      (Accept all responses.)

·      Your heart is a muscle. 

·      It is the size of your fist (hold up your fist).

·      Today we are going to learn how our heart works and talk about how important it is to keep our heart healthy through exercise.

Heart information:

·      How does our heart work?

·      The heart is a pump.  It pushes blood to every part of the body.

·      The heart sends the blood throughout the body to deliver oxygen and pick up waste.

·      (Arteries carry blood away from the heart.  Veins carry blood back to the heart.)

·      The heart is amazing.  It has four special doors called valves that open to allow blood to flow into each chamber of the heart.  The valves only let the blood flow one direction.

·      Tomorrow we are going to have fun and imitate the movement of the heart. 

Let’s watch a YouTube video that shows how the heart works.  I am not so concerned that you learn all the words on the video.  I want you to watch how the heart works and watch how the valves of the heart work.

·      How a Normal Heart Pumps Blood YouTube video:

·      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JA0Wb3gc4mE

Poster: Why is Physical Activity Important? Display on LCD Projector.

If your heart is a muscle, what can you do to keep it strong and healthy?

·      (Accept all answers.  Add clarification.)

·      Physical activity and exercise keep our hearts strong.

·      Read top portion of poster to second graders.

·      Ask a second grader who is paying attention to come up and use the cursor/pointer to identify a “low intensity” activity on the Physical Activity Pyramid (e.g., “walking the dog”). 

·      Differentiation and behavior management:  Catch a student being good!  Look for and pick a student who usually doesn’t pay attention who is now paying attention.  Ask this second grader to come up and point to a moderate intensity activity that they recognize.  Ask another second grader to come up and point to a high intensity activity that they recognize.   

Closure

·      What does our heart do when we are physically active?

·      Look for the following answers: It pumps blood throughout our body; exercise improves blood circulation; our hearts get stronger the more we exercise.

Heart Health Two

Experiment: How Heart Valves Work

Age: Second grade

National Standard:  Student will comprehend concepts related to health promotion and disease prevention to enhance health.

Objective: Students will be able to describe what the their heart does when they are physically active.

Materials:

Plastic honey or ketchup squeeze bottles (empty)

Basins

Teaching Strategies & Procedures:

What is a pulse?

·      Our pulse tells us how fast our heart is beating.

·      Our pulse can tell doctors how well our heart is working.

Let’s take our pulse

·      We will take our resting heart rate. 

·      Hold your hand in front of you.

·      Gently place two fingers of your other hand on top of your wrist.  Do not use your thumb! 

·      Keep adjusting your fingers until you feel a steady beat.

·      Differentiation and behavior management: I will have two volunteers, students who are paying attention, come to the front of the room.  (Catch some inattentive student being good!)  I will help you multiply the number you get by 4 to get your resting heart rate. We will use these numbers as examples of a resting heart rate.

·      We will quietly count the beats for 15 seconds.  GO!

What happens to our heart rate when we exercise?

·      You are correct.  Our heart beats faster.  Our heart rate increases.

·      What happens to our heart when we exercise and our heart rate increase?

·      Yes!  Our heart gets healthier!

We are going to experiment with something that is similar to our heart and our heart valves.  Think about the video you saw yesterday of a healthy working heart. 

·      Use old honey or ketchup squeeze bottles.  Fill them with water. 

·      Discuss proper, safe classroom use of squeeze bottles as needed.

·      Allow children to work in pairs or trios and take turns squeezing and releasing squeeze bottles (with valves) into plastic washbasins. 

·      It is as if you are a heart pumping and moving blood!

Closure

·      Once again, what happens to our heart rate when we exercise?

·      Yes!  Our heart rate increases.

·      What happens to our heart when we exercise?

·      You are correct.  Our heart gets healthier!

Bibliography

American Heart Association. (2012). Elementary lesson plans.  Retrieved from http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/Educator/FortheClassroom/ElementaryLessonPlans/Elementary-Lesson-Plans_UCM_001258_Article.jsp on November 18, 2012.