Overview

This page provides sample activities that schools can use to support health promotion projects funded through the School Health Promotion Fund. Activities are organized by health topics and designed to support student engagement, community involvement, and curriculum-based learning.

Healthy Living

Food related ideas

• Grow your own produce to learn how seeds and plants produce food. See the Grow at Home toolkit for educators. Seedlings can be brought home or used as a classroom fundraiser.
• Host a cooking class to teach basic food handling skills such as washing, chopping, assembling, and storing food.
• Take an on-the-land harvesting walk to look for edible plants like tea leaves, rose hips, or berries.
• Invite a community member to discuss local harvesting and traditional medicines.
• Invite a community member to demonstrate how traditional foods (such as wild meat) are dressed and prepared.
• Host an educational workshop with a Community Health Worker, such as a dietitian or Community Health Representative (CHR). For example, create edible art projects.
• Prepare or purchase unique foods and host a taste testing event to introduce students to new flavours.
• Visit a local grocery store with a budget to prepare a health snack for the class.

Beverage related ideas

• Create a “Drop the Pop Family Challenge” where students and their families reduce or stop drinking sugar-sweetened drinks. Calculate savings from not buying drinks.
• Organize a science fair where students investigate the effects of sugar-sweetened drinks on health.
• Schedule a field trip to a water treatment facility.
• Invite Elders to share stories about the importance of water.
• Host school-wide activities focused on healthy drinks. For example, students can create lower sugar drinks and hold a taste test to choose a winner.

Physical activity related ideas

• Plan field trips to places like pools, arenas, field houses, gymnastic clubs, nature trails, or yoga studios. Include messaging about the benefits of physical activity.
• Organize a “Step Count Challenge” using pedometers or activity trackers.
• Take students on the land to review traditional ways of being active, such as collecting firewood, checking fishing nets, and setting up wall-tents.

Substance use prevention

Educate students about the risks of smoking, vaping, cannabis, alcohol, and other substances.

• Invite an Elder to discuss changes in community health and share healthier ways of coping with stress.
• Organize a science fair where students investigate the effects of different substances on health.
• Host a classroom demonstration with a CHR with pig lungs to show the long-term effects of smoking.
• Invite local groups such as MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) and SADD (Students Against Drunk Driving) to discuss impaired driving and safety.
• Plan a mocktail event to promote sober fun. Include competitions for best tasting or most creative mocktail.

Sexual Health

Educate students about sexually transmitted blood-borne infections (STBBIs), relationships, consent, and reproductive health.

Important: Some activities may require parental or administrative consent. Adapt for age-appropriateness.

• Host a relay race that includes properly putting a condom on a banana or demo penis
• Run a sexual health quiz (e.g., jeopardy-style) with buzzers.  
• Use a theatre-style game to explore consent in non-sexual scenarios.
• Use Giant Microbes to create a play or puppet show introducing the STBBIs, symptoms, and treatments.
• Simulate an STI outbreak using water cups and pH indicators to show transmission. Repeat with “protected” cups to demonstrate condom use.

Infectious disease prevention

Teach students about hand hygiene, vaccines, safe sex, and food safety.

• Use a Glow Germ kit to demonstrate proper handwashing and microbe spread.
• Play Delay Freeze Tag to explain incubation periods and disease transmission.
• Model herd immunity using the STEM activity.

Injury prevention

Promote safety in road use, water activities, and outdoor environments.

• Organize a canoeing workshop to teach water safety (in a pool or outdoors).
• Visit the local municipal enforcement office to learn about road safety and tour the facility.
• Play the “Fake Inspector” game where students identify safety hazards in a staged or real environment.
• Offer Wilderness First Aid or Immediate First Aid training.
• Create an escape room focused on school safety. Include hazards like slippery floors or exposed wires and puzzles related to safety practices.