For Youth

ThinkFirst for Youth is a unique, literature-based curriculum for grades 4–6 that teaches children important risk-prevention strategies while helping them improve their critical thinking, reading and writing skills.

The Youth program focuses on brain and spinal cord anatomy, injury prevention violence and conflict resolution, risk taking and alcohol use/abuse. These areas are addressed through the following mediums:

• Literature-Mick Harte Was Here and The Whirligig
• Writing assignments
• Group projects
• Classroom discussions
• Brain models
• In-class presentation by ThinkFirst

Mike Harte Was Here and The Whirligig, two shorts works of fiction, from the centerpiece for a variety of discussion and writing exercises, and classroom projects.

Helping Students develop Safety Habits

The three-to five-week program is designed to be flexible, allowing teachers to integrate the program's core topics with other subjects or use them as the basis for a more extended course.  

Developed with guidance from educators, the Big Kids curriculum also was designed with many of the Oregon Education Content Standards and Benchmarks for grade 5 in mind. 

The ThinkFirst programs were identified as an example of best of practice in the category, Comprehensive Community Based Prevention Strategies, by Life Span Adaptation Projects, University of Toronto, in July 2000.

Our goal is to help students develop safety habits that will minimize their risks of sustaining a brain or spinal cord injury.  Our intents is to make the learning experience fun, yet meaningful, and to involve not only teachers, but also parents and the community.  

Schedule ThinkFirst for Youth

To schedule ThinkFirst for Youth in your school, please contact ThinkFirst Oregon at (503) 494-7801 or E-mail thnkfrst@ohsu.edu.