Activities: activity-7
SKILLS: Refusal Skills
Suggested Time Consideration: 20 mins
RATIONALE
To provide students with tips for resisting peer pressure, this activity includes suggestions on how to say “no” to friends. It complements the “How to Say ‘No'” poster and demonstrates concrete examples of what adolescents might say if pressured to use tobacco or nicotine products.
GETTING STARTED
Display the “How to Say ‘No” poster (included in the “Materials” section). Review the tips with your students. Then, share the digital activity link below.
Read the introduction and directions together. Note that students will see the “How to Say ‘No'” poster onscreen and can click to enlarge it in a separate window. Ask students to keep the window open so they can refer back to the poster. Then, ask students to complete the activity independently.
While students are completing the activity, list the “Ways to Say ‘No'” on the board or chart paper.
TALKING ABOUT IT
Once everyone has completed the activity, bring students together for a class discussion to review the different strategies for saying “no” to negative peer pressure. Ask students:
- Which strategies listed on the activity do you think would be easy to use if you were pressured to use tobacco or nicotine?(Tally the students’ responses next to the examples.)
- Are there ideas that you would be more comfortable using than others? (Again, mark the answers next to your list on the board or chart paper.)
- How else could you say “no” to friends who might pressure you to smoke or vape? What would you actually say in this situation?
- Are some ways to say “no” better for certain situations than others? For example, if a friend asked you to lie on his behalf, would you use the same method of saying “no” as you would if a friend asked you to use tobacco or nicotine?
WRAPPING UP
Encourage students to keep this list someplace where they can refer to it periodically if they need tips for saying “no.”
HOW I AM
This section has students look at how they act, feel, and think. Topics covered include self-esteem, social image, decision-making skills, and personal values (what is important to each student). The activities are designed to provide students with a chance to practice decision making and to empower them to make healthy choices.
SKILLS: Refusal Skills
Suggested Time Consideration: 40 mins
RATIONALE
It can be uncomfortable for students to reject pressure from friends (or from within) to do something they don’t want to do.
GETTING STARTED
Ask students to share examples about when they might have found themselves in uncomfortable situations, and how they managed to get out of them. Then, share the digital activity link below with your students. Review the suggestions for saying “no” to tobacco and nicotine, and display the poster that provides refusal tips while doing this activity. You’ll find the poster link in the “Activity Resources” section.
TALKING ABOUT IT
Have students work in groups for the “Act It Out!” exercise. Select some groups to act out the scenarios for the class. Ask the rest of the class which refusal techniques might work best. Discuss the possible consequences that might ensue from the different techniques.
WRAPPING UP
In discussion, get students to talk about which refusal techniques work better than others. Explain that in order to choose the best technique for them, they need to feel comfortable with it. They also need to consider whom they are refusing and how that person will receive the refusal. (Is this someone who responds well to humor? to confrontation? to politeness?) Get students to talk about the usefulness of practicing these sorts of strategies ahead of time so they are comfortable using them.
SKILLS: Building Self-Esteem/Understanding Personal Values
Suggested Time Consideration: 20 mins
RATIONALE
What’s important to an individual influences his or her decisions. This exercise is designed to help students understand what sorts of things they value and how they communicate that information to others. It will help them think about what image they want to portray.
GETTING STARTED
Share the digital activity link with students and tell them they’ll be making a list of things that are important to them. You may want to offer some examples (e.g., family, religion, a pet, sports, honesty, etc.). In other words, items of importance can be people, places, things, or even concepts.
While there is no set amount of items, encourage students to come up with at least ten.
After students make their lists, they will be asked to write down ways in which they communicate or show others what is important to them. Again, you may want to offer some examples. A religious person, for instance, may wear a religious icon around his or her neck. An athlete may hang a poster of his or her favorite team in his or her locker. A person who values honesty may have a reputation for beginning sentences with, “I don’t know if you want to hear this, but to be honest with you…”
TALKING ABOUT IT
In getting students to talk about what’s important to them and how they communicate that to others, encourage discussion about positive and negative ways of communicating values. Get them to discuss not only what they are communicating but how it is being received by the other person. For instance, one young man may put a great deal of importance on his role as a member of the school’s football team, but if he is conveying this to someone who tried out for the team but didn’t make it, he might make that person feel envious and resentful. You may want to role-play some of these. For instance:
- Choose two students.
- Give one a piece of paper on which you have written: “You have just been introduced to the person across from you. One of the most important members of your family is your pet dog, Oscar. You never tire of telling Oscar stories, and you decide to communicate Oscar’s importance in your life to this person.”
- Give the other person a piece of paper on which you have written: “You have just been introduced to the person across from you. During the course of your conversation this person is going to communicate to you something that is important to him or her. Recently, your family had to put your 14-year-old family dog to sleep.”
Have the class discuss this from two perspectives:
1) There is nothing wrong with knowing what is important to you and communicating it to others; and
2) This should be done with sensitivity.
WRAPPING UP
Ask students to volunteer answers to the question in the “You Decide!” section of the activity, which asks how being tobacco and nicotine free reflects what’s important to them. Take the opportunity to encourage students to see that using tobacco and nicotine does not reflect a positive image or healthy lifestyle. Ask students to give you examples of words and actions that do exhibit positive images and a healthy lifestyle. Write their ideas on chart paper and post it in the room as a reminder to students.