‘Tar wars’ teaches dangers of tobacco
When parents or educators try to tell their children about the dangers of drug and tobacco use, sometimes the message to “Just Say No” doesn’t seem to register with today’s youth, so educators have started to get creative.
Recently fifth grade students at Russellville Elementary School participated in “Tar Wars,” which is a tobacco-free education program from the American Academy of Family Physicians. RCS Drug Free Schools Counselor Nancy Cooper presented the two 30-minutes classes that show the dangerous and deadly effects of tobacco use and illustrate through activities the long- and short-term problems that the students will encounter if they start to use tobacco.
“We do an exercise where the students estimate how many people their age use cigarettes, cigars or smokeless tobacco,” Cooper said. “The students tend to guess very high, so it’s good for them to see that much fewer people smoke than they tend to think. Hopefully when they’re thinking that everyone is doing it but them, they’ll go back to this exercise and remember that it really isn’t so many.”
Cooper said the program also focuses heavily on the short-term effects of tobacco use since the students can grasp these more easily than something that could happen 20 years down the road.
“We talk about how tobacco gives you stinky breath, makes your clothes and hair stink, and we talk about the cost of using tobacco,” Cooper said. “The cost really seems to impact them.”
But the program’s illustrations of the long-term effects of using tobacco have also stuck with several fifth graders, who said the two presentations really made them think about the consequences of trying just one cigarette.
“If you start smoking, it is very hard to stop, so I’m not ever starting,” Joseph Kiel said.
“It can really damage your body and you can die from it at a young age,” Angela Fuentes added.
The program also talks about how tobacco use can lead to cancer, which children are learning more and more about these days through events like the Relay For Life, which will be held this coming Tuesday.
“The big one for me was the word ‘cancer,’” Caleb Mays said. “That’s a no brainer – don’t smoke.”
Cooper has used the “Tar Wars” program for two years now, and fifth grade teachers have been able to see the value in getting this message across to their students.
“The students really enjoyed working on the ‘Tar Wars’ program,” fifth-grade teacher Stephanie Mayfield said. “We do not have D.A.R.E this year, so it was very interesting and informational.
“This is a critical age to hear this message because these are the formative years in which you try to instill character education and good health habits. Hopefully, in some small way, what they have learned this year will go with them as they continue to become life-long learners.”
