Frederic C. Bartter
General Clinical Research Center (GCRC)
Science Education Partnership Award (SEPA)
The SEPA Program has been administered by the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR) since the early 1990s. Originating in the Division of Research Infrastructure, the SEPA Program moved to the Division of Clinical Research within NCRR in 2002 to be more closely aligned with patient oriented clinical research endeavors. Dr. Lichtenstein began working with middle school teachers in 1993 - the resulting program and its materials are titled Positively Aging® and have been supported by the SEPA program since 1997.
Positively Aging® is an innovative interdisciplinary instructional program that grew from an active partnership between the working scientists of the UTHSCSA and middle school educators from Northside Independent School District (NISD) and Northeast Independent School District (NEISD) in San Antonio, Texas (TX). The partnership’s innovative approach uses examples from the Gerontologic Sciences to enhance education in the areas of pre-college math, life and behavioral science (health promotion and disease prevention). For example, if a student needs to learn the physical concept of density, the Positively Aging® materials contain a lesson plan that teaches this concept using bone mineral density as the focus. From this point, there are integrated lessons on bone biology and bone turnover, osteoporosis, and health behaviors that can attain and maintain healthy bones across the life span.
The Positively Aging® project has produced a set of classroom-ready instructional materials for middle school students that meet the NCRR SEPA goals to (a) improve the quality of math and science education in public schools, and (b) promote an understanding of behaviors that increase the risk of disease. The materials and instructions for use are all available at our website – http://teachhealthk-12.uthscsa.edu/. All the teaching materials have been carefully mapped to the middle school Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS). The website contains a searchable database to determine which lessons from Positively Aging® can be used to teach a specific TEKS area.
Our team also developed a teacher training program, named ‘Stealth Gerontology®,’ to support teachers interested in using the existing materials or adapting them for their classrooms. We are particularly interested in teacher training and support at the in-service
level. The Stealth Gerontology® program brings teams of teachers to the UTHSCSA each summer for an intensive week long instruction in the content areas related to aging and training in use of the Positively Aging® teaching materials. The picture to the right shows a seventh grade science teacher in the 2002 Stealth Gerontology® program learning about bone density and its measurement with the GCRC DEXA scanner.
Since 1997, Positively Aging® has been supported by two SEPA grants (Phase 1 and 2) from NCRR (R25-RR-12369, Michael J. Lichtenstein, M.D., Principal Investigator), with co-funding from the National Institute on Aging, and National Institute for Dental and Craniofacial Research. Positively Aging® has set three long-term objectives:
1. To provide innovative, effective teaching materials that center on math and science curricular elements and are based on examples from the Gerontologic Sciences. Positively Aging® seeks to improve the quality of math and science instruction so that students will remain in these educational tracks and be scientifically literate.
2. To help students learn to make critical, life determining decisions for extending and enhancing their own lives. To accomplish this goal, students must recognize life events that are associated with aging across the life span by investigating factors (health promotion, disease prevention) that affect the quality-of-life for all humans, but especially aged individuals.
3. To help students develop a sensitivity to the needs and concerns of the aging population. To accomplish this goal, students must appreciate the diversity among aged individuals (especially cultural differences) and confront ethical issues associated with aging.
SEPA Phase 1 (1997-2000): Phase 1 SEPA grants are designed to create and evaluate science education materials. In our Phase 1 SEPA, we used a combination of qualitative and quantitative evaluation methods to test the effectiveness of our teaching materials. In a controlled evaluation in two middle schools, use of the Positively Aging® materials was associated with a significant improvement in children’s images of elders (Gerontologist 2001, 41(3):322-332). Analysis of students’ responses to prompts about aging indicate that they do not associate observed age related changes (e.g., ‘wrinkles’ or ‘slowing down’) with specific diseases (such as diabetes). Middle school children envision much more positive vigorous futures for themselves, compared to their parents and or other elders. This student knowledge gap presents opportunities for health promotion and disease prevention education incorporated in the science, math, and health curriculum at the middle school level.
SEPA Phase 2 (2000-2003): Phase 2 SEPA grants are designed to test strategies for disseminating the materials evaluated in Phase 1. For the present grant period, we have two specific aims:
1. To establish an interactive web site to facilitate and support distance learning to
improve:A. Knowledge and skills specific to math and science curricular elements for students.
B. Professional development for teachers in knowledge specific to Gerontology and
the aging process.2. To test and contrast the effectiveness of two sustained dissemination strategies. This controlled study of dissemination compares a program of teacher training followed by distance electronic support (e-mail, WWW interactions) alone compared to teacher training with distance electronic support plus in-school personal support from the Positively Aging® project staff. We are testing the hypothesis that in-school personal support facilitates dissemination of the Positively Aging® materials beyond what can be achieved by computer based distance electronic support alone.
The Positively Aging® website was fully operational in August 2001 (Specific Aim 1). We are in our second year of sustained dissemination and tracking utilization of the website and classroom use of the teaching materials (Specific Aim 2).
Positively Aging® Publications to Date:
1. Lichtenstein MJ, Marshall C, Pruski L, Blalock C, Murphy D, Lee S, Hilsenbeck SG. Positively AgingTM: Choices and Changes – Creating Interdisciplinary Middle School Teaching Materials Using Examples from Geriatrics and Gerontology. Educational Gerontology 1999; 25:555-569.
2. Lichtenstein MJ, Pruski LA, Marshall CE, Blalock CL, Murphy DL, Plaetke R, Lee S. The Positively Agingâ teaching materials improve middle school students’ images of older people. Gerontologist 2001; 41(3): 322-332.
3. Lichtenstein MJ. “Exchange Student: Middle-School teachers educate an academic physician” in Live and Learn: Perspectives on the Questing Spirit. Lawson CS, Lawson RF, editors. The Chrysalis Reader, Volume 8, pp 61-67. Swedenborg Foundation Publishers, West Chester, Pennsylvania, 2001.
4. Lichtenstein MJ, Pruski LA, Marshall CE, Blalock CL, Lee S, Plaetke R. Sentence completion to assess children’s views about aging: Middle School students do not associate age-related problems with disease (Submitted).
Date page last modified: 04/29/04 02:27 PM
