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Focused on Youth, Health and Smart Choices
YES You Can…
Build Healthy Relationships!
Level 3 Curriculum
Welcome to the
YES You Can!
Curriculum and congratulations for choosing an excellent tool to
encourage students to live a healthy, strong and focused lifestyle in the teen years.
The Centers for Disease Control’s
Sexual and Reproductive Health Report of Persons
A
ged 10-24
Years
tells us that many young persons in the United States engage in sexual risky behavior and
experience negative reproductive health outcomes. The story is told not only in physical consequences
that may include teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease, but also in emotional harm that may
manifest itself in depression and suicidal ideation.
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Finally, the millions of parents and educators who
knew that to be true had an official authority backing them up. Well, identifying risk is one thing.
Having a plan to deal with it is another. The key to helping young people avoid risk and make healthy
choices is a three-pronged approach: the right information, a realistic application to one’s life, and
sincere encouragement and support. In other words, give teens the facts and help them to believe that
they can make difficult, yet wise, choices in their own best interest.
That’s where the
YES You Can!
Curriculum comes in. You will find in the pages that follow concepts,
commentary, and activities that will bring your classes to life as together you consider the serious
issues of growing up in the 21
st
century. Serious though they may be,
YES You Can!
lessons are replete
with upbeat, interactive and enjoyable exercises that convey encouraging messages and helpful
strategies. Here’s just a sample of what
YES You Can!
teaches:
True freedom does not mean saying YES to every opportunity, but saying NO to choices that
are not best for us.
Success in life is more likely if we focus on dreams and goals.
How friendship, marriage/lifetime commitment and sex are components of a healthy life.
What a healthy love relationship looks like and how to sustain it.
Choices that produce and affect pregnancy
Risk elimination vs. risk reduction in the matter of STDs/STIs
The deadly combination of drugs, alcohol and sex
How true freedom leads to good choices and healthy outcomes.
Our teens, more than ever, need us to be honest and directive. As you share information and
encouragement, you will make a huge difference in your students’ lives. As you show young people
the benefits of waiting, remember that parents and teens themselves are eager for this message. Now
you have the means to share it!
YES You Can…Build Healthy Relationships!
speaks to the health of all students, including LGBTQ
and those transitioning, because this is a medical health message and as such, the information applies to
all.
For the health of our young people,
Peggy Cowan
President, NJ Physicians Advisory Group
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Hallfors, DD, Waller, MW, Bauer, D, Ford, CA, & Halpern, C.
Which Comes First in Adolescence - Sex and Drugs or Depression
?
Am. J. Prev. Med., 2005;29:3, 163-170 and Hallfors, DD, Waller, MW, Ford, CA,
Adolescent Depression and Suicide Risk: Association With
Sex and Drug Behavior
, Am. J. Prev. Med., 2004;27:224-31.
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