Welcome to Part 4 of our Series: What are People Doing? Examples of Successful Projects

The Sarasota Y is helping parents of pre-school youngsters through HIPPY (Home Instruction of Preschool Youngsters) by expanding its curriculum-based program to include health literacy and ESOL supports.  Non-English speaking parents were supported in the past through small class offerings; however, staff recognized the need for enhanced offerings.  To improve our support for these families, staff have developed a partnership, via a Memorandum of Understanding, with the Literacy Council of Sarasota.  The Council provides comprehensive English classes for parents whose second language is English.  Since most of our parents are low income and have limited access to transportation, these classes are held at a location easy for our parents to access, and the Sarasota Y pays the class registration fee for participants.  The following is an example of how HIPPY has benefited one mother through its collaborative efforts.

Manuela participated in HIPPY with her daughter and son, ages seven and six.  Although she spoke very little English, with the help of HIPPY, Manuela learned how to be engaged in her children’s education.  Manuela was struggling to teach herself English and had purchased an English dictionary to help her with words she encountered when assisting her children with homework.

HIPPY offered ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) classes for our Spanish speaking families, which Manuela attended twice each week.  She says that the teacher really helped her learn new words and how to form sentences.  Manuela says she is now much better prepared to teach her children.  She helps them with homework daily and has become actively involved at their school.

HIPPY has not only helped Manuela develop her language skills and provided her an avenue to assist her children on academic assignments, but also has empowered her to take control of her health issues through the HIPPY Health Literacy program.  She attended every health and parenting group meeting, sometimes walking 2 to 3 miles from her home to the HIPPY office to attend.  Manuela had not been to the doctor in years.  With assisting her, she acted on the knowledge she gained during the health literacy component of the program to identify resources and find a doctor.  The health consultant worked with her on planning healthy meals, and she loved the cooking demonstration classes.  She and her family are eating healthier, and she is dedicated to continuing these healthy habits.  Manuela lost over 40 pounds and continues to maintain her healthier weight and exercise routine.  She says she is thankful for all the programs we provide through HIPPY.  They have enabled her to be healthy, be her children’s first teacher and be involved in the school and community, and more importantly, HIPPY has helped her make sure her children are ready to succeed in school.

The Florida Literacy Coalition has developed three different health literacy books: Staying Healthy, Coping with Stress, and Women's Health. All of the books come with a student or teacher's guide. The goal of each of these books is to enhance students' understanding of health information, while at the same time improving their English language and literacy skills. As an ESOL or ABE teacher, you do not need to be a health expert or even a health educator to incorporate health into your class. Your role as an instructor is to give students the language, literacy, and communication skills they need to find information aabout their health. The Teacher's Guides to this series include ideas for lessons, activities, and other suggestions for presenting the information in ways that will help in the learning process. 

For the past five years, FLC has been fortunate to partner with Florida Blue to sponsor the Florida Health Literacy Initiative. Through this Initiative, 15-18 grantees are selected each year to engage in different health literacy activities. While it is not a requirement to use Staying Healthy, the majority of the grant recipients choose to use it with their students and we are able to see how it is used in different programs. Grantees integrate health literacy into existing ESOL and family literacy classes or host it as a stand alone course. The curriculum itself fits better with a high-beginning, low-intermediate ESOL population, but it has been used with ABE students as well. On average teachers spend one class period per week on a chapter in the book. 

Teachers have remarked on how easy it is to incorporate project-based learning activities into the chapters of the book. Here are a few examples of activities teachers have done with their students as they complete the curriculum. Literacy programs in Florida can receive Staying Healthy for free, but all other programs are able to order copies of the book with this form. 

Chapter 1: Health Care

• Practicing conversations to have with doctors
• Creating a list of questions to bring to the doctor's office
• Researching local offices that will provide free or reduced cost care
• Bringing in a health insurance navigator or go on a field trip to their office. 

Chapter 2: Your Doctor

• Creating a health history form
• Bringing in a health care provider to ask questions that they are nervous about asking when they are in the office
• Taking blood pressure and identifying if it is normal or if the students are at risk of hypertension

Chapter 3: Medicines

• Field trip to the local pharmacy to understand OTC and prescription labels
• Practicing conversation on questions to ask the pharmacist
• Bringing in teaspoons to measure liquid medicine. 

Chapter 4: Nutrition

• Taking a field trip to the grocery store and practice eating health on a budget
• Having students bring in nutrition labels from their favorite foods to compare which ones are healthier
• Making a recipe book with your students based on family or cultural favorites
• Planting a community garden

Chapter 5: Chronic Diseases

• Having students create posters and health information brochures on asthma, diabetes, and heart disease. 
• Testing blood sugar levels in class
• Participating and hosting different fitness activities to show that preventative measures can be cheap and easy. 

Chapter 6: Staying Healthy

• Hosting a health fair and have students present on what is healthy vs unhealthy
• Practicing stress relief activities

Through the common denominator of health literacy, ESOL students and instructors have worked together to reach health-related goals. Unique to each campus, students have chosen various aspects on which to place to focus, such as doing presentations on (avoiding) long-term illnesses, devising a multi-ethnic nutritional cookbook, and sharing and discovering yoga, meditation and various other stress-release strategies. Additionally, DSC staff members have been partnering with the Mexican and Colombian Consulates in Orlando in a community collaborative effort for a health awareness week (turned month). Health fairs were housed in various counties, including one at the Farmworker’s Association in Pierson. Overall, students, teachers and staff have stepped up their health and wellbeing awareness, greatly due to the springboard of Staying Healthy’s curriculum and through the support of the Florida Literacy Coalition and Florida Blue.