June 13, 2023

Never thought the arts could fit into health and wellness? With Y4Y’s new Health and Wellness for All course, you and your staff can encourage an attitude of well-being and creativity. Take notes from dance, movement, meditation, culinary arts, and more! 

Calm Waters

If you need a "first mate" to help you assess and support the health and well-being of students, families, and staff, Y4Y's Health and Wellness for All course will set sail to get you there. You'll get practical guidance to help every student develop lifelong skills and habits in nutrition, physical activity, and self-care. The course tools will help you plan, design, implement, and assess your health and wellness activities. From healthy snack ideas to physical activity examples to family engagement surveys and more, you’re sure to find inspiration for your program.

Imaginatively Healthy!

Research offers many reasons why establishing a good relationship with health and wellness now will set your students up for success in the future! See the Health and Wellness for All Research Brief for more facts; here are a few to get you started:

• Good nutrition, physical activity, and stress reduction can improve learning and life outcomes such as academic success, life expectancy, and risk of chronic diseases.
• Reducing stress positively impacts students’ social skills and mental energy.
• Getting enough sleep helps people focus and pay attention, make decisions, manage emotions, and more.

Consider Incorporating some of these “imaginatively healthy” activities into your program and watch the results speak for themselves!

• Ask a local museum to host a “museum race.” Pair your students up, give them criteria for recording information on the various art pieces, and see which group can record the most information! It’s a great way to increase heart rate and get some steps in.
• Have students make a playlist of appropriate, calming music and use it as the playlist for a yoga or meditation session.
• Bring culinary arts and film into the equation! Have students vote on a dish from a favorite movie, like the ratatouille from the movie Ratatouille, make any necessary dietary modifications, and prepare it together while watching the movie.
• Show students that dance can be a fun way to get your body moving. Split students into teams, have them choose an appropriate song, and let them choreograph their own dance. You could even split it over the course of a few days and have each team teach the other teams their choreography!

If you and your staff place priority on infusing creativity and student wellness together, magical things are sure to follow. When students learn that Health and Wellness can be an artistic and creative reprieve from the doldrums of everyday life, they will be more likely to incorporate it into their everyday lives—now and well into their adulthood.