The development of a dental health education curriculum for Brookline, Massachusetts

Abstract

Dental health education in the Brookline, Massachusetts public school system is an integral component of a proposed health education curriculum which has been developed for the 1981-82 academic year. The dental health program will be implemented in grades K-8 as a discrete, planned curriculum entity. In addition, the principles and facts learned in dental health education will be integrated and reinforced in other related areas of the health curriculum. Dental caries is the most prevalent disease of children and Brookline chidren are no exception.The magnitude of the problem is recognized by many professional health and educational organizations including the American Dental Association and the Massachusetts Department of Education. These organizations have set up guidelines and criteria for developing a dental health education program. It is from these models and criteria that an innovative curriculum has been developed which meets the needs of Brookline. In addition, the incorporation of dental health education into the overall curriculum has been mandated by Massachusetts General Law. The perceived benefits of the development and implementation of a dental curriculum are multi-fold. First, it will serve as a guideline for school dental health instruction. Secondly, the internalization of psychosocial attitudes instilled within the child toward dental care will motivate the child and parents to seek regular professional care. The promotion of sound dental health practices will lead to the prevention and early detection of dental disease.The expansion of dental knowledge and prevention principles will result in a dentally educated population comprised of wise dental consumers. Next, it will serve as a fact finding experience through the involvement of students, teachers, dentists and others concerned with school dental health. The scope of this project is the development of a dental health curriculum for grade K-8. Specifically, goals, objectives, suggesteded activities and a teacher's manual have been written for each grade level and lists of sources of additional information are provided. Suggested methods of evaluation and implementation of the program have been developed for teacher use and actual program will not be implemented nor evaluated by the program developer.