Learning Progression Example

The following reading standards—taken from the Common Core State Standards—

provide an example of how learning progressions work and how each standard builds
on the previous one, increasing in complexity as students advance from one level to the
next:
 Kindergarten: Identify the front cover, back cover, and title page of a book.
 First Grade: Know and use various text features (e.g., headings, tables of contents,
glossaries, electronic menus, icons) to locate facts or information in a text.
 Second Grade: Know and use various text features (e.g., captions, bold print,
subheadings, glossaries, indexes, electronic menus, icons) to locate key facts or
information in a text efficiently.
 Third Grade: Use text features and search tools (e.g., key words, sidebars, hyperlinks)
to locate information relevant to a given topic efficiently.
 Fourth Grade: Describe the overall structure (e.g., chronology, comparison,
cause/effect, problem/solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or information in a text or
part of a text.
 Fifth Grade: Compare and contrast the overall structure (e.g., chronology,
comparison, cause/effect, problem/solution) of events, ideas, concepts, or information
in two or more texts.
 Grades 6–8: Analyze the structure an author uses to organize a text, including how
the major sections contribute to the whole and to an understanding of the topic.
 Grades 9–10: Analyze the structure of the relationships among concepts in the text,
including relationships among key terms (e.g., force, friction, reaction force, energy).
 Grades 11–12: Analyze how the text structures information or ideas into categories or
hierarchies, demonstrating understanding of the information or ideas.

Defining Health Promotion and Disease Prevention

Health promotion and disease prevention programs focus on keeping people healthy.
Health promotion programs aim to engage and empower individuals and communities
to choose healthy behaviors, and make changes that reduce the risk of
developing chronic diseases and other morbidities. Defined by the World Health
Organization, health promotion:
enables people to increase control over their own health. It covers a wide
range of social and environmental interventions that are designed to
benefit and protect individual people’s health and quality of life by
addressing and preventing the root causes of ill health, not just focusing on
treatment and cure.
Disease prevention differs from health promotion because it focuses on specific efforts
aimed at reducing the development and severity of chronic diseases and other
morbidities.
Wellness is related to health promotion and disease prevention. Wellness is described
as the attitudes and active decisions made by an individual that contribute to positive
health behaviors and outcomes.
Health promotion and disease prevention programs often address social determinants
of health, which influence modifiable risk behaviors. Social determinants of health are
the economic, social, cultural, and political conditions in which people are born, grow,
and live that affect health status. Modifiable risk behaviors include, for example,
 tobacco use, poor eating habits, and lack of physical activity, which contribute to the
development of chronic disease.
Typical activities for health promotion, disease prevention, and wellness
programs include:

 Communication: Raising awareness about healthy behaviors for the general public.

Examples of communication strategies include public service announcements, health
fairs, mass media campaigns, and newsletters.
 Education: Empowering behavior change and actions through increased knowledge.
Examples of health education strategies include courses, trainings, and support groups.
 Policy, Systems, and Environment: Making systematic changes – through
improved laws, rules, and regulations (policy), functional organizational components
(systems), and economic, social, or physical environment – to encourage, make
available, and enable healthy choices.

Alcohol and Drug Abuse

Use and abuse of drugs and alcohol by teens is very common and can have serious
consequences. In the 15-24 year age range, 50% of deaths (from accidents,
homicides, suicides) involve alcohol or drug abuse. Drugs and alcohol also contribute to
physical and sexual aggression such as assault or rape. Possible stages of teenage
experience with alcohol and drugs include abstinence (non-use), experimentation,
regular use (both recreational and compensatory for other problems), abuse, and
dependency. Repeated and regular recreational use can lead to other problems
like anxiety and depression. Some teenagers regularly use drugs or alcohol to
compensate for anxiety, depression, or a lack of positive social skills. Teen use of
tobacco and alcohol should not be minimized because they can be "gateway drugs" for
other drugs (marijuana, cocaine, hallucinogens, inhalants, and heroin). The
combination of teenagers' curiosity, risk taking behavior, and social pressure make it
very difficult to say no. This leads most teenagers to the questions: "Will it hurt to try
one?"

A teenager with a family history of alcohol or drug abuse and a lack of pro-social skills
can move rapidly from experimentation to patterns of serious abuse or dependency.
Some other teenagers with no family history of abuse who experiment may also
progress to abuse or dependency. Therefore, there is a good chance that "one" will hurt
you. Teenagers with a family history of alcohol or drug abuse are particularly advised to
abstain and not experiment. No one can predict for sure who will abuse or become
dependent on drugs except to say the non-user never will.

Warning signs of teenage drug or alcohol abuse may include:

 a drop in school performance,

 a change in groups of friends,
 delinquent behavior, and
 deterioration(the process of becoming progressively worse. ) in family relationships.

There may also be physical signs such as red eyes, a persistent cough, and change in eating
and sleeping habits. Alcohol or drug dependency may include blackouts, withdrawal
symptoms, and further problems in functioning at home, school, or work.

Health Consequences of Drug Misuse

Mental Health Effects
Image
Photo by ©iStock/FGorgun(link is external)

Chronic use of some drugs can lead to both short- and long-term changes in the brain,
which can lead to mental health issues including paranoia, depression, anxiety,
aggression, hallucinations, and other problems. 

Many people who are addicted to drugs are also diagnosed with other mental disorders
and vice versa. Compared with the general population, people addicted to drugs are
roughly twice as likely to suffer from mood and anxiety disorders, with the reverse also
true. In 2015, an estimated 43.4 million (17.9 percent) adults ages 18 and older
experienced some form of mental illness (other than a developmental or substance use
disorder). Of these, 8.1 million had both a substance use disorder and another mental
illness.1 Although substance use disorders commonly occur with other mental illnesses,
it’s often unclear whether one helped cause the other or if common underlying risk
factors contribute to both disorders.

Learn more about substance use and general co-occuring mental health disorders.

Drugs that can cause mental health problems:

 Cocaine
 Inhalants
 Ketamine
 Kratom
 LSD
 Marijuana
 MDMA
 Methamphetamine
 PCP
 Prescription Drugs
 Steroids (appearance- and performance-enhancing drugs)