Temple/St. Luke's medical students engage Bangor area sixth graders in active learning about health

Students from The Medical School of Temple University/St. Luke's University Health Network visited Bangor Area School District’s sixth graders at DeFranco Elementary School to provide an interactive health education and science assembly to interest students in healthy living and disease prevention.

Each of the topics involved a hands-on activity to help demonstrate the functions of the systems of the body; balanced nutrition; proper hand washing and the importance of vaccinations/immunizations.

St. Luke's Anderson Campus has partnered with Bangor Area School District and the Slater Family Network since January 2014 with a collective goal of improving the overall health and wellness of the student population. The goal of the St. Luke’s Adopt a School Program is to improve health outcomes of Bangor Students through Mobile Youth Health Services (Medical, Dental, Vision Vans, Mental Health Assessments and Programs), Healthy Living Initiatives (Tail on the Trail, Live Your Life, School Gardens, Nutrition and Health Education Programs), Literacy Programs (Dr. Seuss Day), and Youth and Career Development Programs.

About the Health Education Program

Topics being addressed with the students included nutrition, body systems and communicable and chronic diseases.  Three medical students (Class of 2015) from The Medical School of Temple/St. Luke's University Health Network developed creative and engaging activities to stimulate learning and encourage an understanding of how students can do their best to make good choices to improve their overall health and well-being.  They then recruited additional Temple/St. Luke's medical students, who volunteered to help facilitate the activities in a small, classroom setting.  A pre- and post-test will be included to measure the impact of the learning objectives.