What's Risk Watch?

Risk Watch is a comprehensive injury prevention resource for elementary school teachers. The program consists of a variety of activities, resources and lesson ideas that teachers of Pre-Kindergarten to Grade 8 can easily incorporate into their daily lesson plans. The aim of the activities is to prevent childhood injuries by teaching students safe decision-making practices.

Risk Watch is divided into five teaching modules covering the following grade levels: Pre-Kindergarten/Kindergarten; Grades1/2; Grades 3/4; Grades 5/6 and Grades 7/8. Each module includes age-appropriate activities and resource materials on the eight leading causes of injury among children: motor vehicle injury; fire and burn injury; choking, suffocation and strangulation injury; poisoning injury; falls and playground injury; firearms injury; bike and pedestrian injury; and water and ice injury.

Why Teach Injury Prevention?

• The number one health risk to Canadian children aged 14 and younger is unintentional, preventable injury.
• In Canada, the leading cause of death and disability for children is preventable injuries. More children die annually from injuries than from all other childhood diseases combined.
• Unintentional falls are the leading cause of hospitalization among children.
• Almost 40,000 children and youth are seen in hospital emergency departments every year due to home injuries.
• The annual economic burden of unintentional injuries for all ages is $8.7 billion.

Source: SMARTRISK, a national injury prevention organization

Why Risk Watch?

Risk Watch is the newest, most comprehensive injury prevention program for children in Ontario. It attempts to teach safe behaviour by affecting the way children think about and approach risk.

Central to Risk Watch is the “Look First, Think Twice, Choose Smart” decision-making process. All lesson activities teach students to assess the risk in situations and apply knowledge to make educated, safe choices. Students apply this thought process to various scenarios in each risk area to foster safe decision-making in all aspects of their daily activities. By affecting students' decision-making process, Risk Watch seeks to teach skills that will prevent injury for the rest of their lives.

Designed by teachers for teachers, Risk Watch is easy for teachers to use in their classrooms. The program includes:

• Suggested ways to incorporate safety lessons into daily lesson plans in core subject areas (i.e. science, math, language arts, physical education, health, visual arts, drama, music).
• Age-appropriate activities that help teachers meet learning objectives set out in the provincial curriculum.
• Detailed lesson plans that include opportunities for reflection prior to and following lessons, related activities for split-grade classes, and in-class and wider school extensions.
• Easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions to implement the lesson activities.
• Challenging and varied injury prevention activities that foster sequential learning and the development of critical thinking skills.
• A focus on Canadian and regional issues (use of ATV’s and snowmobiles, rural issues, ice safety, forest fires, etc.).
• Canadian statistics, legislation and resources on each risk area providing all the background information needed to effectively teach safety lessons to students.
• New assessment tools that make it easy for teachers to meet the provincial curriculum’s reporting needs.
• Activities that extend learning into the home and community.
• Community resources teachers can access for more information on specific risk areas.
• The teaching of behaviours rather than rules and the inclusion of positive language (“Do” instead of “Don’t”).
• Availability in French.

Risk Watch in Canada

Risk Watch was originally developed in the United States by the National Fire Protection Association. It was first field-tested in Ontario in 1997 in Brockville. Since that time, it has spread to 43 areas across the province and continues to expand.

Since the first field-testing in Brockville, a number of enhancements were identified for the program. Because it was developed in the United States, the original program included resources, statistics and teaching techniques that were not always relevant to Canadian classrooms.

Beginning in 2003, the Ontario Office of the Fire Marshal, the Ontario Fire Marshal’s Public Fire Safety Council, the Alberta Fire Commissioner's Office and SMARTRISK, a leading Canadian injury prevention organization, updated and expanded the program for use in Canadian schools.

Teachers and educators, curriculum experts, injury prevention specialists and injury prevention researchers from across Canada were consulted to ensure the most relevant teaching techniques and injury prevention information was incorporated into the Canadian version of Risk Watch.

The program has undergone extensive revision to include the information, resources and teaching methods outlined above.

For more information about Risk Watch contact riskwatch@ofm.ca