My Take: Online Learning and the Future of School Health Education

By Joseph A. Dake, PhD, MPH, FASHA | March 10, 2014

I recently went to a lecture by Salman Khan of Khan Academy to hear him talk about his vision of a “One World Schoolhouse.” I was familiar with Khan Academy—my sixth-grade son is using it to learn Java programming—but I was skeptical of this push toward online education.

 

I’d heard recently that some middle and high schools were considering the development of 100% online options to satisfy their health education requirements. As a faculty member who teaches future health educators, and as a person married to a national-award-winning high school health teacher, I saw many problems with this. I wanted to learn more about Khan’s approach and the way he sees the future of education.

As it turns out, I left his lecture both excited and full of new ideas. It was evident that Sal Khan doesn’t see online learning as a replacement for teachers, but as a tool to aid both students and teachers. In fact, he emphasized the importance of the personal touch in the classroom.

Khan developed Khan Academy to encourage teachers to use their limited classroom time to focus on building critical thinking and skill development. The online learning component is simply a means for students to gain content that can be learned independently. This is content students have traditionally learned by listening to a teacher talk in front of the class or completing assigned reading.

In health education, there are many critical issues to cover. Because few school districts dedicate time to teach health education in every grade, schools (and often the health teachers themselves) must decide what topics to address. While I hope schools would select their topics based on the most important health needs of their students, this can still be a daunting task.

Research and Evidence Can Help

Luckily, there are research- and evidence-based tools that can help. I believe the most important of these is the CDC’s Health Education Curriculum Analysis Tool (HECAT), which is based on the National Health Education Standards and the Characteristics of Effective Health Education Curricula. The HECAT permits teachers to identify the most important topic areas for their students and select the particular behaviors they want to address. They can then see the research-based content that needs to be covered, along with the detailed skill expectations most likely to positively affect student health behaviors.

It’s clear in the HECAT that functional knowledge serves as an essential foundation for changing behavior, but this functional knowledge alone is not sufficient. We must also address the skills students need to lead productive, healthy lives.

Within the National Health Education Standards, Standard 1 covers aspects of functional health content—i.e., the concepts, literacy or information that helps students engage in the desired healthy behavior. All of the remaining Standards—Standards 2 through 8—focus on skill development. This is really the cornerstone of quality health education.

Infusing Technology Into the Health Ed Classroom

Thinking about this distinction is what got me so excited about Sal Khan’s lecture, and how we can infuse technology and online learning into the health education classroom. Curricula and tools can be developed to help teachers assign online “homework,” which would be the functional knowledge portion of the health class (Standard 1). Then the actual classroom time can be spent building upon that functional knowledge, as the teacher explains, models and has students practice the skills (Standards 2-8) needed to lead a healthy lifestyle. This “flipped classroom” approach is certainly a trend right now, and I hope that health education stays at the forefront.

This is why I’m also excited about what ETR has developed in HealthSmart, its comprehensive K-12 school health curriculum. HealthSmart is based on the HECAT, and focuses on both functional knowledge and skills from the National Standards. For schools, HealthSmart takes most of the work out of developing a quality comprehensive curriculum based on research and best practice.

A Lesson Planning Tool

ETR has also developed an online Lesson Planning Tool that allows schools to create a tailored curriculum based on their specific needs. I look forward to seeing ETR continue to venture down the road of integrating technology and health education. I would love to see Khan-style online modules focused on functional knowledge that teachers could assign for completion at home. Then the corresponding HealthSmart activities could be used to address the skill development aspects in the classroom.

If teachers are evaluated based on the performance of their students, quality assessments will be critical. Another development I’d like to see is a tool for testing functional knowledge. Online test banks designed based on this knowledge would allow teachers to develop quality pre-test and post-test measures to measure their students’ educational growth. These online tools could be used to supplement the skill assessments that would take place in the classroom, where teachers can actually observe their students during practice sessions.

Let's Focus on Skills

If we want students to be knowledgeable, productive and healthy citizens, building a strong health education curriculum focused on skills is critical. Quality health education leads to behavior change. Healthy students are better learners. They have better attendance and fewer discipline problems. We need school administrators to understand these relationships, learn how health education helps support every other subject taught in school, and, most important, see how quality health education can make a positive impact on the lives of their students.

I feel invigorated and optimistic about the future of health education. It’s clear to me that now is the best time to refresh and refocus our school health education curricula to include online tools and innovations to help achieve the life-changing results that are possible.

Joseph A. Dake is Professor and Chair, Department of Health and Recreation Professions, at the University of Toledo. He can be reached at joseph.dake@utoledo.edu and you can find him at LinkedIn.