Checkpoint+4

=WOW! Wonderful submission!! Very thorough, discusses all your subtopics and provides great supporting evidence. Also, kudos on the perfect APA in-text citations. Great job!! 2/2 points=

= DUE: Wednesday, May 26th, by 3:30 pm =

Checkpoint 4: Research-Based Rationale In the box below please provide the reasons for selecting the topic and the critical importance of teaching it to elementary students. In this portion you should provide answers to the following: 1. How does the health issue impact students? 2. How does the health issue effect teachers? The classroom? 3. How does the health issue impact schools? 4. How does the health issue impact communities?
 * Instructions:**

Use a minimum of 3 current empirical-research journal articles to support your claims. You should cite literature/statistics to justify the importance of your topic and describe the scope of the problem. Additional resources (such as credible websites, children’s literature, available curriculum, etc.) can be used as well but the focus should be on what we know from the research. Remember: Wikipedia is not a reliable source and should not be used. You must use appropriate in-text APA citation and formatting but do not have to add the entire reference at the end as I have that information from the previous checkpoint submission. The minimum length is (approximately) one page and there is no maximum. Only one submission may be made per group and do not make any attachments.

**Home and Street Safety Rationale ** Home and street safety is a grave topic that affects the lives of children all over the United States; therefore, this subject matter should not be left out when educating our nation’s students.Often their can be the misconstrued notion that home and street safety only effects kids outside the classroom and thus should be the job of the family to teach.This thought process is incorrect and continues to allow unintentional injuries, in and/or out of the home, to be the “leading cause of morbidity and mortality among children in the United States” (CDC, 2009, para. 1).These safety issues cross all boundaries and effect students, teachers, schools, and communities and as a result should be given the needed time and focus within the education curriculum. Adding home and street safety education into the classroom would have the forefront goal of impacting the students.When educating students about something as important as safety it is crucial that the same guidance and rules come from all authorities.T he Home Safety Council (2010) reported that home safety impacts “an average of 2,096 children in the United States” each year (para. 5).In these studies it showed that of the above mentioned children most die from causes related to “fires, burns, choking, suffocation, drowning and submersions” (Home Safety Council, 2010, para. 5). Deaths that result from these causes are often unintentional, especially among children under the age of 15. Teaching elementary students about the dangers in the home, such as unintentional falls and poisoning, as well as in the street, such as dealing with strangers and pedestrian safety, is critical. Educating children about street and home safety will provide them with the information and skill set to prevent unintentional injuries from occurring, whether they are at home unsupervised or come across a danger on the street. Since home and street safety impacts kids in all environments, including the school environment, it is important that children have this knowledge repeatedly presented to them so that when an actual dangerous situation arises it can be avoided all together or handled in the safest way possible. With the increase in pressure on teachers with regards to student performance on standardized tests, teachers are vying for every moment of instructional class time. However, students who are absent from school due to home or traffic injury easily fall behind in class work and in their knowledge of important academic concepts, which can affect students’ performance on standardized tests. Accordingly, those 600,000 children who are hospitalized each year due to unintentional injuries (Kiriakou and Morrongiello, 2003) translate into up to 600,000 students whose classroom and testing performances are affected by these unintentional injuries. These unintentional injuries are not limited to the home, however. Many school scenarios, including field trips and hands-on classroom activity, present similar dangers to children. According to an analysis of the 2001 National Personal Transportation Survey, 12.9% of students walk or bike to school (McDonald, 2007). Furthermore, the U.S. Department of Transportation reports that 82% of pedestrian fatalities and 76% of bicyclist fatalities are at the fault of the pedestrian or bicyclist (Spainhour, Brill, Sobanjo, Wekezer, & Mtenga, 2005). Accordingly, roughly 13 of every 100 students are exposed to a high risk of traffic accidents and traffic fatalities due to their ignorance of traffic safety procedures. The amount of students who are put at risk may increase significantly during field trips, which often expose students to some form of street-crossing or sidewalk traffic. Aside from traffic safety, child abduction has recently become another heavily-discussed topic among parents and lawmakers. According to the April 2001 FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, “strangers are responsible for about one-half of elementary school abductions, and acquaintances, such as neighbors, family friends, and adult associates are responsible for the rest” (Lord, Boudreaux, & Lanning, 2001, p.8). Furthermore, an analysis of 671 abduction cases in South Carolina revealed that 40% of the abductions by a stranger occurred on school grounds and 71.2% occurred in a parking lot (including school parking lots). In addition, a majority of these abductions occurred around 5:00pm, right after school hours (Miller, Kurlycheck, Hansen, & Wilson, 2008). Based on this information, teachers may be able to positively affect the number of students who escape abduction situations by educating students on the proper safety behaviors and emphasizing the need for these behaviors – even on school property. Within the classroom, the most common hazards that students may face include fall and poison hazards. Poison hazards present a unique problem for educators who frequently involve their students in science activities or keep toxic substances, such as cleaning supplies, within their classrooms. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2008), there were 423 chemical incidents in elementary or secondary schools between 2002 and 2007, which resulted in 895 injured persons and 11 hospitalizations. In addition, 62% of these incidents were caused by human error, including “improper chemical storage and unsafe, improper use of materials or equipment” (CDC, 2008, para. 6). Taking into account the number of injuries, fatalities, or abductions that are due to a lack of knowledge or awareness on the part of the victim, it is painfully apparent that children are not receiving information in an effective manner regarding home and street hazards; however, this lack of knowledge may be in part to caregivers’ unawareness of safety hazards. In a study conducted by Patel, Groom, Prasad, and Kendrick (2008) of 763 caregivers in Nottingham, England, 30.9% of participants did not know if oral contraceptives were harmful to children, 21.2% did not know if iron tablets were harmful to children, and 20.8% did not know if turpentine was harmful to children. Furthermore, 66.2% of the caregivers believed that painkillers were only harmful in large mounts, 50.7% believed that cough medicine was only harmful in large amounts, and 44.4% believed that children’s antibiotics were only harmful in large amounts (Patel, Groom, Prasad, & Kendrick, 2008). In accordance with these results, the study also reported that “although most medicines and household products are put away immediately after every use, a considerable number of parents do not put painkillers for children, cough medicines and essential oils away immediately”, which could cause a serious health hazard (Patel, Groom, Prasad, & Kendrick, 2008, p. 392).These statistics show that parents lack the proper knowledge to educate their children on drug and chemical safety and hence the role of proper safety education needs to be placed within the classroom. Another study that was conducted by Gaines and Schwebel (2009) examined the ability of “novice parents of toddlers ages 12-36 months, day-care employees, and pediatric healthcare workers” to identify common hazards in an imitation bedroom, living room, and bathroom (p. 1070). The results of the study demonstrated that the novice parents were the most effective at identifying hazards; however, all three groups identified less than half of all of the hazards that were present (Gaines and Schwebel, 2009). In a final study of parental knowledge and usage of safety behaviors conducted by Morrongiello and Barton (2009), researchers found that parents were more likely to physically supervise younger children and visually supervise older children while crossing the street. Furthermore, researchers found that, although 52% of participants believed that children should be explicitly taught how to cross the street, only 10% provided physical instruction during the observation (Morrongiello and Barton, 2009). These studies only reinforce the importance of teaching home and street safety skills in the elementary classroom. Parents are often unaware, uneducated in the area themselves, or unable to teach their children about such hazards.Thus the responsibility to teach these skills lies in the hands of educators. Lessons that incorporate home and street safety practices have shown to be effective in increasing students’ knowledge and awareness of the hazards. Zhe and Nickerson (2007) examined 74 children’s reactions to an intruder crisis training lesson and drill in a school environment. The results of this study illustrated that the lesson and drill were effective in “students’ short-term knowledge acquisition of drill procedures” but did not affect students’ anxiety levels during the actual drill (Zhe and Nickerson, 2007, p. 506). The information presented above indicates the dire need for home and street safety education within America’s classrooms. In addition, teachers’ professional expertise and the availability and effectiveness of home and street safety education programs place educators in an excellent position to fulfill this need in the education system. The impact of injuries on children causes a ripple effect, first affecting the child, the family, the classroom of the child, and lastly the entire community.This issue touches the emotions of community members as well as has an impact on the health of community members and the amount of money that is spent on health costs. According to an article in the Journal of Pediatric Psychology, “each year at least 600,000 children in the United States are hospitalized,” as a result of unintentional injuries (Kiriakou and Morrongiello, 2003, p. 285). This means that each year 600,000 children, families and communities could have avoided unnecessary pain and financial burden.When communities are faced with a tragic injury or loss of a child it often results in the communities coming together for mourning. With proper community education and awareness there is the potential to bring connectedness within a community with the goal of preventing injuries before they happen.For this reason it is vital that children be taught appropriate methods of home and street safety in order to minimize these injuries and make communities a safer place for all of its members. Studies show that many parents rely on their day to day care to keep their children safe rather than focusing on ways of preventing accidental injuries; when in actuality preventing these injuries altogether is the best way of avoiding them from happening (Kiriakou and Morrongiello, 2003). With this said, it is vital that schools take the responsibility of teaching home and street safety. If students are taught appropriate home and street safety knowledge at a young age, they will make safer choices from childhood all the way through adulthood. Overall, teaching home and street safety in the classroom will produce more educated students, families and teachers as well as safer communities.This will lead to a decline in the amount of accidental injuries children are suffering from with the result being more healthy and happy children in the learning environment of the classroom.