Resource and information support for
tobacco prevention and education across
school subject areas
Contents
Personal and social education (PSE) ........................................................................................ 3
Information and facts ................................................................................................................ 3
Lesson or session activities ..................................................................................................... 4
Biology ................................................................................................................................................. 8
Lesson or session activities ..................................................................................................... 8
Modern Studies and Geography ................................................................................................. 9
Lesson or session activities ..................................................................................................... 9
Chemistry ......................................................................................................................................... 10
Information and facts ............................................................................................................. 10
Art and Design and Media Studies ......................................................................................... 10
Information and facts ............................................................................................................. 10
Lesson or session activities .................................................................................................. 11
English ............................................................................................................................................... 13
Lesson or session activities .................................................................................................. 13
Physical Education ....................................................................................................................... 13
Lesson or session activities .................................................................................................. 13
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Personal and social education (PSE)
Information and facts
These one - page Fast Fact sheets provide up-to-date, easy to digest and easy to
use information on a wide range of smoking and tobacco issues in Scotland.
Simply click on the links below to download the information that you need:
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Smoking in Scotland
Young people and tobacco
Second-hand smoke
Stopping smoking
Nictotine addiction
What is in a cigarette?
E-Cigarettes
Illicit tobacco
Tobacco control in Scotland-key dates and legislation
The Scottish Government and NHS Health Scotland have also produced a useful
infographic that helps to highlight and summarise the current picture with
regard to tobacco use and young people in Scotland.
Tobacco use in Scotland – the current picture
Additional introductory resources
In addition to these introductory activity sessions, the following information
resources provide an excellent foundation for you to develop and run your own
short sessions with the pupils that you work with:
Social smoking
Sometimes, people think that they aren't really a smoker because they only
smoke a couple, or they only smoke when they are out with their friends. Here
are some useful tips to help challenge these ideas.
E-Cigarettes
E-cigarettes are very much the ‘new show in town’ meaning that research and
information on the longer term health impact and content is constantly being
updated.
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Taking into consideration that we currently do not have a great deal of research
on e-cigarettes, why not ask pupils to give you their thoughts on some of the
potential benefits and problems with their usage? Write them down on post-it
notes and use that to shape your discussions. You can download this e-cigarettes
information page for some ideas on the pros and cons.
Mythbusters
Talking to young people about tobacco means that you are going to need to
debunk a few myths: 'Smoking makes you thin' 'Smoking menthols is better for
you' or how about 'I'm a social smoker, I won't get addicted'. Make sure that you
have some answers by using the Mythbusters page from The Filter.
What's in a cigarette?
A cigarette is cured tobacco leaves covered in white paper. That doesn't sound
very dangerous! However, when a cigarette is lit and starts to burn it releases
over 4000 different chemicals. The Filter have an excellent set of slides that
highlight some of the nasty surprises found in a cigarette, including chemicals
used in batteries, and others that are used to make fertilisers.
The Tobacco Industry
They want and they need young people to start smoking. They need to sell
cigarettes in order to make as much money as possible and they need to replace
the 49,000 people in Scotland who quit smoking or die from tobacco related
causes each year. Find out more about the tobacco industry's crafty tactics here.
Smoking and your looks
Smoking affects every part of your body, not only on the inside, but on the
outside too. Find out what it does to your skin, face and hair.
Smoking also speeds up the signs of ageing. Click here to take you to a game
which demonstrates how smoking will affect your appearance.
Lesson or session activities
These short activities are designed to introduce key tobacco issues to young
people and offer scope for young people to learn more and further explore
tobacco issues that they are interested in.
Is everyone doing it? Quiz
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Age: Any.
Group size: Any.
Preparation time: 5 minutes.
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Activity time: 30 minutes.
Social norms govern our behaviour- the way we look, the way we talk, the way
we act, the choices and the decisions that we make. Unfortunately, some young
people see some risky health behaviours like smoking, drinking alcohol or taking
drugs as being a normal or an acceptable thing to do because they have a
perception that most of their friends or their peers are doing it.
The real picture shows that most young people are actually making good and
healthy behaviour choices. They generally don’t confuse common misconception
with reality.
This quiz is a useful way for you to start to address and discuss some of the
common pre-conceived ideas and misconceptions that many people have about
young people and tobacco use.
You can download the activity sheet for the everyone is doing it quiz here.
You can download quiz sheets for everyone is doing it here.
You can download the everyone is doing it answer sheet here.
Agree or Disagree
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Age: 12+
Group size: One group of 10-15 people.
Preparation time: 30 minutes.
Activity time: 60 minutes.
Agree or Disagree is a simple, short session activity that is designed to encourage
young people to start to share their views on tobacco issues. It also gives you an
opportunity to gauge which smoking and tobacco issues the young people that
you work with seem to be most interested in.
You can download the Agree or Disagree activity sheet here.
Harm to Health - Body Parts
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Age: Any.
Group size: Any (in groups of 4/5).
Preparation time: 20 minutes.
Activity time: 30-45 minutes.
Hopefully most of us are aware of the general harm to health that is caused by
smoking and tobacco use. What might be slightly less well known amongst the
young people that you work with, is the significant damage that smoking and
tobacco can cause to just about every part of the human body. This short activity
is designed to help highlight the harm caused to the human body by tobacco use.
You can download the Body Parts activity sheet here.
You can download the Body Part cartoon pictures here.
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You can download the Body Parts answer sheet here.
Cost of Tobacco
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Age: Any.
Group size: Any (in groups of 4/5)
Preparation time: 10 minutes.
Activity time: 30 minutes.
The Filter, a tobacco prevention project for young people based in Wales, have
developed an excellent and easy to use resource that focuses on the cost of
tobacco. Smoking is not only costly for health, but for bank balances too. The
average pack of 20 cigarettes costs around £8 and the average 25g of rolling
tobacco is pretty similar. See what you could buy if you quit smoking today. Cost
of Tobacco cue cards
Responsibility Ladder
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Age: 12+.
Group size: Any (in groups of 6-10).
Preparation time: 60 minutes.
Activity time: 30 minutes.
The Responsibility Ladder is designed to encourage participants to think about
who and what can influence a young person's decision to start smoking and help
participants to take personal responsibility for choosing not to
smoke. Download the activity sheet for Responsibility Ladder.
Smoking and your looks
Smoking affects every part of your body, not only on the inside, but on the
outside too. Find out what it does to your skin, face and hair.
This excellent leaflet, called ‘Looking Hot, But Smoking’s Not’ was put together
by Fast Forward assisted young people and NHS Lothian. It is aimed at 12-14
year olds and it features two teenage characters having a conversation about
smoking.
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Short tobacco prevention films
A partnership project between Edinburgh College and NHS Lothian has resulted
in the production of a series of short films about tobacco prevention. This
exciting and innovative project gave young film-makers an opportunity to
highlight tobacco issues from their own unique perspectives. Why not have a
look at them and gather some ideas?
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Real Smokers Film
Time to Change Film
Why Start Smoking? Film
Smoking and You Film
Another Day Film
Breathe! Film
Helping young people to quit smoking
R2Q is and app designed to help young people quit smoking and kick the habit
for good. Commissioned by www.w-west.org.uk and the NHS Greater Glasgow
and Clyde, it is a tool for helping young Scots stop smoking.
You can download the R2Q app here for iOS and Android
Other subject areas
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Beyond the traditional PSE setting for tobacco prevention and education, we can
also help to support the development of tobacco prevention messages across a
broad range of subject areas. These include:
Biology
Lesson or session activities
Harm to Health - Body Parts
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Age: Any.
Group size: Any (in groups of 4/5).
Preparation time: 20 minutes.
Activity time: 30-45 minutes.
Hopefully most of us are aware of the general harm to health that is caused by
smoking and tobacco use. What might be slightly less well known amongst the
young people that you work with, is the significant damage that smoking and
tobacco can cause to just about every part of the human body. This short activity
is designed to help highlight the harm caused to the human body by tobacco use.
You can download the Body Parts activity sheet here.
You can download the Body Part cartoon pictures here.
You can download the Body Parts answer sheet here.
Benefits of Quitting Activity
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Age: Any.
Group size: Any. Preparation time: 30 minutes.
Activity time: 30 minutes (longer for bigger groups).
The Benefits of Quitting Activity is designed to help young people learn more
about the health benefits of quitting tobacco.
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The activity described on the session is basically a youth work focused activity
where everyone ties a blown-up balloon, with a piece of paper/statement inside,
to their ankle. The participants then try to burst each other’s balloons whilst
keeping their own intact. In school, we needn’t use the balloons!
All participants need to do is find the person who has the answer to their
statement, or vice-versa. Once they have met their statement partners, the pairs
need to read out their Qs and As and lead on to further discussion of tobacco
issues.
You can download the Benefits of Quitting activity sheet here.
Smoking and your looks
Smoking affects every part of your body, not only on the inside, but on the
outside too. Find out what it does to your skin, face and hair.
Smoking cigarettes speeds up the signs of ageing. Click here to take you to a
game which demonstrates how smoking will affect your appearance.
Modern Studies and Geography
Lesson or session activities
Tobacco and the law
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Age: 12+.
Group size: Any, in groups of 2-4.
Preparation time: 20 minutes.
Activity time: 30 minutes.
Over the last few decades we have seen the introduction of some major pieces of
legislation that have shaped how tobacco is branded, how tobacco is marketed,
that have placed restrictions on the age that people can buy tobacco and where
tobacco can be smoked.
The Tobacco and the Law Timeline Game is designed to highlight when some of
the important tobacco control legislation was put in place and offers an
opportunity for young people to discuss:
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Why the legislation was implemented.
How legislation may have shaped attitudes and perceptions with regard
to smoking and tobacco.
Further legislative steps that might be needed to further discourage
tobacco usage.
The activity sheet for the Tobacco and the Law Timeline Game can be
downloaded here.
The Game Cards for Tobacco and the Law Timeline can be downloaded here .
The answer sheet can be downloaded here.
Youth of the World is a Global Citizenship resource for young people. The
resource uses six everyday commodities as a starting point to explore global
interdependencies: water, tobacco, chocolate, textiles, mobile phones and
sustainable food.
The resource is an ideal place to further the learning of young people in your
youth group about tobacco within a global context.
A free resource pack and activity sheets are available for download.
In addition to the Youth of the World resource, Unfair Tobacco is a German based
online resource page. It has a wealth of information, tools and resources that
focus on the environmental degradation caused by tobacco and human rights
violations by the global tobacco industry. They also advocate and lobby for
alternatives to tobacco growing for smallholder farmers.
Chemistry
Information and facts
Whilst we have not yet a developed a full activity sheet, we do have useful
information that would support a Chemistry based session looking at the
chemical content of a cigarette.
A cigarette is cured tobacco leaves covered in white paper. Doesn't sound very
dangerous. However, when a cigarette is lit and starts to burn it releases
over 4000 different chemicals. The Filter have an excellent set of slides that
highlight some of the nasty surprises found in a cigarette, including chemicals
used in batteries, and others that are used to make fertilisers. With every
cigarette you smoke you inhale these chemicals and absorb them into your body.
Art and Design and Media Studies
Information and facts
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The Smoke & Mirrors website carries a wealth of information about how the
tobacco industry works, from how tobacco is produced, child labour, to the ways
it is marketed, despite advertising restrictions, the role that the media plays in
this, as well as considering the impact that tobacco and alcohol have around the
world.
Lesson or session activities
Packaging-the silent salesman
 Age: 12+.
 Group size: Any, in groups of 4-6.
 Preparation time: 20 minutes.
 Activity time: 30 minutes.
Following the near-total ban on overt tobacco advertising in the UK, introduced
in 2003, research has shown how the tobacco industry has reacted by ‘making
the pack the hero’.
Remember, cigarette packs are nothing more than boxes for transporting and
carrying cigarettes. So why have tobacco companies put so much effort, thought
and money into designing a simple box?
Cunning design is no accident. The tobacco industry has long been working out
how to modify the shape, size and opening of packs to influence whether people
view cigarettes as risky or appealing.
Developing an appreciation of the importance of pack design means that we can
start to understand why standardised packaging for cigarettes was introduced in
the UK in May 2016.
This exercise will help you to challenge the belief that smoking is simply down to
choice and expose some of the tobacco industry methods for targeting young
people.
The activity begins by asking young people to critically look at different cigarette
packaging and to think about:
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Who are the packs targeted at?
What gender are they being targeted at?
What age are the packs being targeted at?
Why have those colours, images and fonts been used?
Why do the packs open in the way that they do?
Why are the packs shaped that way?
Are the packs cool or appealing?
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The activity then asks young people to compare branded cigarette packs with
standardised cigarette packs, discuss the differences between them and to think
about which of the packs they find most/least appealing.
You can download the activity sheet for the packaging exercise here.
You can download the pack image sheets for young people here.
You can download the pack image sheets with facilitator notes here.
Design a pack
 Age: 12+.
 Group size: Any, in groups of 4-5.
 Preparation time: 30 minutes.
 Activity time: 60 minutes.
This is a good activity to use with young people if you have already used the
silent salesman activity with them.
Tobacco companies view the issue of youth smoking (including underage
smoking) as critical to their future success.
"Today’s teenager is tomorrow’s potential regular customer…”
(Philip Morris Tobacco Company, 1981, makers of Marlboro cigarettes)
Without new smokers, tobacco companies have a shrinking market as existing
smokers quit or gradually die through disease or old age. To replace these,
13,000 young people in Scotland start smoking each year. That's 36 a day.
For this activity, ask pupils to imagine that they are the directors of a tobacco
company. They have a new range of cigarettes that they want to promote and
sell. They need to make them as attractive as possible to young people. Now ask
them to think of a name for their product and design a pack for their product.
You can download the activity sheet for the design a pack activity here.
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English
Lesson or session activities
Agony Aunt
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Age: Any.
Group size: Any (in groups of 4/5).
Preparation time: 5 minutes.
Activity time: 30-45 minutes.
The Agony Aunt activity is designed to help you to get young people listening,
thinking and talking about tobacco use amongst themselves and their peers.
Divide participants into groups of 4/5 and explain each is an ‘editorial team’.
Explain that we are all working for ‘Teens’ magazine in the ‘problem page’ office
and that we need to prepare a response to a letter from a young person who has
some worries about smoking and tobacco.
Simply click on this link to download the Agony Aunt Activity Sheet.
Physical Education
Lesson or session activities
Breathing activity
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Age:
Group size:
Prep time:
Activity time:
What you need:
Any
Any
5 minutes
30-45 minutes
Straws
The breathing activity game is designed to raise pupil knowledge around tobacco
and the effects smoking can have on breathing.
Download the activity sheet here.
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