Lesson 28: Nutrients for Me

What are Nutrients?
Which ones do I need to keep going and be Happy and Healthy?

Working with your partner, research online to find out:

1. What nutrients do human beings, especially teen girls, need to put into their bodies to keep it going and be healthy? Calcium, Iron, C, B6, Protein...what else?
   
2. What nutrients do the foods on your lists from last week have?
   Choose one food from each food group to research. Present your findings to the class in a google slide show.
3. Here are some helpful links
   
   • Key Nutrients for you
   • Food Guide Pyramid
   • Portion size

Lesson 27: What should I be eating?

Here are links to some food lists that show what you should or should not include in your diet to be at maximum health. These are simply recommendations, you should enjoy what you eat too.
Spring Summer Winter
From these lists:

1. choose some things that you are willing to eat, and record the following in your journal

• 5 vegetables
• 5fruits
• 2 grains
• 2 dairy
• 5 meats and beans(combined)
• 1-2 nuts and seeds

2. list things that you might need to avoid that would be hard for you to give up

Review:
Tai-chi warm up: Angel wings, Master serving tea
Yoga poses today: chair pose, Sun series B, maybe some partner yoga?

Week 26: What's my Constitution?

Your constitution is what you are made up of. This is a combination of body type, emotional type, behavioral type, and mental activity. We did an in class survey to get a general idea of how to best take care of ourselves. We classified three different types, Spring, Summer, and Winter. Based on this information we can see what foods and other health habits are best for out individual constitution.

Tai-chi warm up: Angel wings, Master serving tea
Yoga poses today: chair pose, Sun series B

Day 25: Principal, Values, Beliefs; Your Do's and Dont's for Life

AIM: How can a set of Do's and Dont's help us have high self-esteem, so that we can be be happy and healthy?

Your self-esteem is largely determined by your actions. If you are proud of your actions or behaviors, you will have higher self-esteem. If you are unsatisfied with or embarrassed by your actions or behaviors, your self-esteem will suffer.

Actions usually come from our Thoughts, and thoughts arise out of our Principals, Values, and Beliefs.

Here are some Do's and Dont's from The Yoga Tradition:

Do be:

1. Honest and Clean
2. Content
3. Disciplined
4. Studious
5. Responsible

Dont Be:

1. A liar
2. Resistant or Intolerant
3. Violent
4. A thief or cheater
5. Greedy

Journal Entry #25: Do's and Dont's for Life

Part 1: Write your own definition of these Healthy Living vocabulary terms.

• principals
• high self-esteem
• Low self-esteem
• contentment

Part 2: Create a T chart with the headings "Do" and "Don't"
For each side write 5-10 of your own Do's and Dont's for Life

Lesson 24: Choices, the Six Step Process

AIM: How will the six step process help us make the right choices for ourselves?

Do Now, in Journal:
Write your own definition of these Healthy Living vocabulary terms.

• decision
• action
• reaction
• consequences
• risk
• values

Background information:
Do you have choices all the time? Do you make choices or does it seem like you are on automatic? Feelings may cause us to react to a situation before we think about it, rather than thinking things through and taking the action that really represents us and our values.

Choices are a little like math problems. They should be broken down into smaller steps in order to be decided. Using the following Six Step process, apply it to one of the example situations. Choose one of the example dilemmas(problems). Use the six step process to describe how you would make a decision for this dilemma.

Example Situations:

1. You were planning to go to a birthday sleep over at a friends house Saturday night. You're parents had to change your family plans for Saturday. Now, you are going to New Jersey to visit your Grandparents, who really want to see you and take you shopping and out to dinner. You want to please your parents and Grandparents. You don't want to miss out on the fun with your friends. What should you do?
2. You get better grades in Math than your best friend. You have a math test tomorrow and she is afraid that she will fail it. She says "All you have to do is move your hand so I can see your paper ". You were taught to always help a friend. You were taught that cheating is wrong. What should you do?

Six step process:

1. State the situation(What are the facts, Who else is involved)
2. List the possible choices of actions that you might take
3. List the possible consequences and risks of each action (consider health, ethics-right and wrong, legalities, parent approval)
4. Consider your values (what is important to you?)
5. Make a decision and act on it (choose the action that best supports your values)
6. Evaluate the decision (Imagine the outcome of your choice, is it positive or negative)

Lesson 23: Back bending Poses and Making Choices: Action vs. Reaction

Back bends are poses that help us let go of feelings, release toxins in the body, and also develop flexibility in the spine, and spinal health. Some Poses that are in the back bend family are:

• cobra
• bow
  
• camel
• bridge
• wheel
• fish

Making Choices
Do you have choices all the time? Do you make choices or does it seem like you are on automatic? Feelings may cause us to react to a situation before we think about it, rather than thinking things through and taking the action that really represents us and our values. There is a decision making process that we can go through to make good choices for ourselves, but first lets see how we might make choices in a few example situations.

Journal Entry #23 : Choices, What action would you choose to take?
What choices would you make in these situations? How would you communicate with the other person involved?
1. Your friend is having a problem and wants to talk to you about it. You are also behind on a math project.
2.You are angry with your parents and you want to tell them. You also want them to let you sleep over at your best friends house.
3.You disagree with a grade that you received from a teacher.

Lesson 22: Feelings: Identify, accept, keep or let go

We saw in lesson 21 that feelings can be emotional or physical. For example happy/sad are emotions, hot/cold are physical feelings. This is not surprising because the mind, body, and spirit are connected to one another.
"Like attracts like", is a saying that expresses that the more positive attitudes that we put out into the world the more positive things will come back to us as a result. So if we can redirect our own attitudes to that of being positive and open we will get more happy things back to us. if we can accept ourselves and the negative attitudes and habits that come up in as, but also then let them go quickly, we will avoid more negative things coming our way. We each have the power to shape how our lives will be, positive or negative.

Journal Activity #22: Identify, accept, keep or let go
Copy this in your journal, do the activity and fill in the blanks :
There are Four simple steps that we can do to keep or let go of feelings:

1. identify why and what we are feeling
   
2. accept the emotions
3. notice where we feel it in our body
   
4. decide to keep or let go
   

*********************************************
1. Focus on some one that you love, whoever comes to mind first, write their name or initials in the blank:
When I think of _______________________, I feel love.
2. Continue to focus on this person.
When I think of _________________ I also feel these emotions:____________________, ________________, ______________________.
3. Focus on these emotions.
4. When I think of _________________ I notice a feeling in or around my ______________(body part, inside or outside body)
5. Take an action to symbolize keeping these feelings.
The symbolic action that I took to keep these feelings was ______________________________________________________.
6. Focus on someone that makes you uncomfortable, whoever comes to mind first, write their name or initials in the blank:
When I think of _______________________, I feel discomfort.
7. Continue to focus on this person.
When I think of _________________ I also feel these emotions:____________________, ________________, ______________________.
8. Focus on these emotions.
When I think of _________________ I notice a feeling in or around my ______________(body part, inside or outside body)
9. Take an action to symbolize letting go of these feelings.
The symbolic action that I took to let go was ______________________________________________________.

Day 21: Feelings, Attitude, and Success

How we feel often influences what our attitude is like on any given day or at any given moment. For example if we feel tired or angry, it might be difficult to be patient with other people. Patience is an attitude that others can sense about our personality. Our attitude then has an effect on how successful we are in reaching our goals, reaching our greatest potential. In the example, being impatient might keep us from being successful because other people might not want to work with us or be around us.
Answer the following question to do a self check, reflect on how these three things influence each other.


Journal Entry #21: Feelings, Attitude, and Success

Complete the sentences below, or in the case of a question, answer with complete sentences. Add reasons if you like for your answers.
1. The easiest person in the world for me to talk to is _______________.
2. The hardest person in the world for me to talk to is _______________.
3. Peer pressure is ____________. Peer pressure is real YES __________ NO________
4. How is your attitude related to your success in school?
5. What are three roadblocks to your success.

Week 20: Equanimity, Composure and Confidence

Equanimity
How do you handle stress and distraction?
If you find that you cannot maintain focus as much as you wish you could , or you think that your grades are suffering due to a lack of composure or confidence, you might need to practice. When our mind is calm and stable, we feel relaxed, it feels good. Many of us have a hard time feeling this relaxed, good feeling, it is very uncomfortable becuase we are not used to it. So we lose control of our thoughts and body movements. We wiggle in our seats, call out, take things personally, and even get angry and frustrated sometimes.
When our mind and body are calm and within our control is it called equanimity. It is easy to have this in normal situations, but when unexpected things happen it is a little more difficult to hold onto. Another word for equanimity is composure, and another personal quality that will help us have it is confidence, self-confidence.

Journal Entry #20: Composure, confidence and equanimity
Write your own definition of these three terms. For each term also recall a time that you used these qualities in your own life, or describe a real life situation in which you wish you could have used these qualities.

Day 19: Quality of Attention

Time in: Bunny breath

Discussion: Quality of Attention
• Review: What is a beginner’s mind (What is your attitude like when you are seeing or noticing something for the first time?)?
• What does quality mean in this case?
• What are different qualities of attention?

Warm up: How does your body feel in these locations?

• shoulders: cow face, crab
  
• neck: swan
• back: rocking horse, cobra, locust
  
• hips: butterfly
• legs: shark
• ankles: downward facing dog
• feet: crane
  

Activity: Share your Creative Flow pose sequences from last class.

Relaxation: Animal visualization

Journal Entry #19: Animal Qualities
Make up three poses for animals which we have not already learned. Name them and try to sketch them on your journal. You will show teach them to the class next week.

Day 18: Beginner’s Mind, Open mind

Lesson 18: Beginner’s Mind
What is a beginner's mind? What does it feel like to have a beginners mind? When were you aware that you were a beginner, what were you doing?

If we can approach things in our daily life with an open mind, ready to start fresh, our days will become more interesting and enjoyable. Try to be receptive, open to new and old experiences with the same enthusiasm. Having an open mind usually creates a positive outlook on life, and allows th eperson to be more creative and imaginative.

Journal Entry #18: Creative Flow
Create a sequence of 5 poses that can be done with a smooth flow from one to the next. Use any poses that we have done in class, try them out in order to see if they indeed flow together.
Draw each pose and label it. If you want to, make up some new poses too!

Lesson 17: Lines of Energy

Energy is everywhere, in us and around us. We can become more familiar with controlling our own energy by practicing in Healthy living class. we will practice controlling our mental energy with thinking exercises, and our physical energy with yoga poses.
In yoga poses we use opposing energy to build focus and stability, this will create focus and stability in our thoughts too. Opposing energy can be used by stretching our body in equal and opposite directions. For example in Mountain pose we reach our feet down into the earth at the same time we reach the crown of head up to the sky. This creates one long line form our belly which points up and down at the same time.
If we can be stable and calm in thought, we will feel the effects emotionally too. It is all connected, like infinity!

Journal assignment #17: Lines of Energy
Draw three figures in yoga poses, choose from the following list. Superimpose the energy lines that move in opposite directions over your figure drawings. Don't worry about drawing skills, simple stick figures or bubble figures are just fine!
Poses to choose from:

• Warrior 2
• downward dog
• ragdoll
• cobra
• gate
• triangle
  

Lesson 16: The Power of Positive Thinking

Think Positive, you can do anything!
You can change a sad feeling or negative thought simply by thinking and breathing as you tell yourself the opposite, tell yourself the positives!

Healthy test taking
Healthy habits create an empowered sucessful outcome. Take care of your mind, body, and spirit, by eating well, sleeping well, and thinking positive. If you do your best all will turn out good.

Journal Entry #16: positive thinking

Positive Thinking, Affirmation
(maybe apply to your upcoming Tests?)

1. Identify a fear, complaint, or goal that you would like to see some change in
   
2. Describe how you feel when you think about this thing, describe how you behave when you have these feelings
3. Create positive change by restating this thing and its feelings in an affirmative manner, start your statement with "I am..."

Example:

1. I hate tests.
2. They make me feel nervous and I can't stay focused.
3. I am calm and confident that I will do well on this test, and I know that if my mind wanders I can return to my breath and re-focus myself.
   

Lesson 15: Energy Renewal

The new year is a time of renewal, with the winter solstice comes longer daylight time, we can come our of the long nights part of winter with new intentions for how we will use our energy. This is similar to the way some people make New Years Resolutions, things they hope to change about their lives. In particular I hope that you will use this period of the year to renew your commitment to yourself, your own empowerment and happiness. Be happy with who you are by making good healthy choices for your body, and also your mind and spirit.

Lesson 15 Activities

Co-listening, active listening
Energy renewing breath: mother earth, celestial(star) father
Energy Drawing

Journal Entry #15, Energy Renewal

Place your energy drawing in your Journal and label it #15.

Energy Drawing Practice:

1. start by picking one color to use, choose a color that seems to represent your energy right now
2. draw one line with that color that represents "energy" in any way that you like (there is no right or wrong)
3. use that first line as inspiration, a starting point for a drawing, poem, short story, or personal journal entry about energy
4. stay connected to your breath as you complete the page, if you don't know what to do next on the page, just breath deep and slow and start your pencil moving again.
   
5. Let it flow freely onto the page whatever it is