Planning for Life Skills
The focus of the Health and Family Life Education (HFLE) presentation in Week 2 is life skills education, which includes an overview of its theoretical under-pinning, practical applications and significance. The Iceberg Model is a metaphor for the risky behaviours of students. It implies that outward manifestations of problems like disengagement or disruption are frequently the result of more serious problems like emotional difficulties, low self-efficacy, academic stress and low self-esteem. This view places more emphasis on the teacher’s responsibility to find and address the root causes of student’s behaviour than merely responding to their outward manifestations.
In the Bridge Model, building a bridge over a sea of difficulties is compared to building a bridge made of life skills. These life lessons act as pillars of support, guiding students away from danger and instability and toward happy, healthy lives. The model highlights the value of having a strong foundation of accurate information and admits that while relapses can happen, they can be avoided by practicing these skills again.
According to HFLE there are four life roles:
1. Expanding and changing as a person
2. Coexisting and interacting with others
3. Managing resources (including personal capabilities)
4. Supporting ones local and international communities.
According to the World Health Organization (1997), psychosocial abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour are the life skills that are linked to each of these roles. These promote resilience, self-assurance and effective communication while assisting people in handling the rigors of everyday life. The Life Skills Approach is both transformative and preventive. By strengthening their protective factors, assisting them in overcoming social pressures, making wise decisions and taking accountability for their actions, it empowers young people. Based on principles like social cohesion, democracy and ethics the strategy supports both national and regional development goals.
The document lists useful applications for life skills across a range of subject areas. Using critical thinking and communication skills to dispel myths and make wise decisions is important for sexual and reproductive health. Preventing substance abuse involves promoting healthy environments and fending off peer pressure by employing advocacy and refusal techniques. Using conflict resolution and decision-making techniques to control rage and refrain from aggression is one way to prevent violence. Being emotionally healthy means being able to resolve conflicts with others and express feelings in a healthy way.
Constructivist psychology, theories of child and adolescent development, social influence theory and resilience theory are some of the theoretical underpinnings of the life skills approach. These frameworks support the significance of learner-centred interactive approaches that take into account real-world difficulties. The C. I. A. D. model, a methodical approach to teaching decision-making motivates students to:
1.Describe the issue
2. Look into the options
3. Think about the results
4. Determine value
5. Take action after making a decision
6. Assess the result
Before making decisions, teachers are urged to assist students in critically analysing options, considering their own values and projecting possible outcomes. It is essential for handling complicated situations and preserving one’s wellbeing. In order to reinforce the HFLE framework’s practicality, the presentation ended with role-playing scenarios in which educators and counsellors use life skills to deal with difficult student situations.
CRITICAL QUESTION: How does the Bridge Model in Life Skills Education help students become more psychosocially competent and how does this affect the way HFLE curricula are designed?
RESPONSE: Life skills serve as planks that enable students to move from vulnerability to empowerment as the Bridge Model figuratively demonstrates. Building a structured path backed by correct information, proactive teaching and reinforcement is crucial as it emphasizes. Misinformation, emotional distress, violence and peer pressure are just a few of the sea of negative consequences that students must deal with. Life skills such as self-awareness, emotional control and decision-making serve as support networks that help students make wise decisions.
The model focuses on scaffolding, supports the notion that psychosocial competence—the capacity to manage life’s challenges—develops gradually. Additionally, it acknowledges that students may relapse but can resume healthy paths with the help of curriculum interventions. The model for HFLE curriculum design suggests a layered developmental approach in which the content must change as students’ emotional and cognitive development advances. Instead of focusing solely on information, lessons should be interactive, practical and skills-based. The model supports the curriculum’s dual purpose of development (building competence) and prevention (avoidance of risky behaviours). In the end this method is consistent with holistic education which promotes students’ wellbeing in all facets of life.