Teaching Dental Health in the Classroom

 

Dental Health Activities-February

It is so important to teach dental health to our students at any age. Learning about this at school only emphasizes the importance of taking care of our teeth.

I have two easy activity ideas you can do in your classroom related to dental health.

Brush Your Teeth Activity

 

Steps for making a brushed tooth.

Materials: white paper, pencils, toothbrush for each student, toothpaste

1. Pass out white paper. On the paper, have the students draw a heart that is not connected at the bottom.
2. Draw a line from the left to the right side of the heart towards the bottom of the heart.
3. Draw a cone shape on either side of the heart at the line to make the roots.
4. Erase the inside lines.
5. Give each student a toothbrush and a large dab of toothpaste. Students can practice brushing their paper tooth.

Make a Mouth

The first set of steps for making a mouth;

Materials: pink and red construction paper, 14 mini marshmallows in a baggie for each student, pencils, glue.

1. 1.    Fold the pink construction paper in half.
2. 2.   Draw an unfinished oval from the inside half of each side of the paper.
3. 3.   Draw two molars on either side of the mouth along the fold.
4. 4.   Then draw the ten teeth along the sides towards the middle at the bottom of the mouth.
5. 5.   Give each student 14 mini marshmallows.
6. 6.   Glue each marshmallow on the molars and teeth.

The second set of steps for completing the mouth.

1. 7.   Pass out ¼ sheet of red construction paper.
2. 8.   Draw an unfinished oval starting at one edge of the paper to make the tongue.
3. 9.   Fold along the side of the open end of the oval, place glue on the fold, glue to the inside of the mouth.

Then display them on your bulletin board!

It's amazing how many students do not know how to brush their teeth or how often it should be done. The Chicago Dental Society has some great resources you could use in your classroom. They have a variety of discussion guides on Oral Health that are based on different grade levels. They also have activities and coloring pages to reinforce this concept.

One of my future projects will be to create some teaching resources around the theme of Dental Health. Keep your eyes open for when I post about it.

But if you don't want to wait take a look at Beth Hammett's Dental Health Month. It has fun activities around dental health!

If you want to teach about the tooth fairy, Christy Serra-Gandara has a resource teaching about the different traditions, Tooth Fairy Activity Pack.

Thank you for being a part of this journey. I will continue to work on creating teaching resources and writing blogs that can help you with your students.

Debbie – Froggy About Teaching on Amped Up Learning

                 Froggy About Teaching on Teachers Pay Teachers

#dentalhealth #dentalkidactivities #toothfairylegends #dentalhealthmonth