Read through the instructions and life events with the class and explain any misunderstandings.
A total score of more than 150 indicates that someone may be overstressed. The amount that someone can take varies between individuals.
Use the information in the Teachers' Background to discuss the symptoms of stress.
Ask the students to give examples of how stress can affect people and how someone can help themselves beat stress. Answers may include:
- Make your life as 'regular' as possible
- Give yourself a break each day
- Try and keep some time for yourself
- Try not to do too much work
- Eat more fresh fruit
- Get regular exercise
Recap on the main teaching points and students reflect on what they can do to reduce stress in their lives.
Here are the most common 'weak links' and the symptoms that arise when they malfunction:
- The questionnaire has been adapted from the 'Social Readjustment Rating Scale ' by psychologists Thomas Holmes and Richard Rahe in 1967. They used a similar set of questions to conduct psychosomatic research (how the mind affects the body).
- Too much stress will make you sick. Carrying too heavy a stress load is like running a car engine past the red line or leaving a toaster stuck in the 'on' position. Sooner or later, something will break, burn up, or melt down.
- What breaks depends on where the 'weak links' are in your body.
- Brain - fatigue, aches and pains, crying spells, depression, anxiety attacks and broken sleep.
- Gastrointestinal tract - ulcers, cramps and diarrhoea, colitis (inflammation of the colon) and irritable bowel syndrome.
- Glandular system - thyroid gland malfunction (controls weight gain).
- Cardiovascular - high blood pressure, heart attack, abnormal heartbeat and stroke.
- Skin - itchy skin rashes.
- Immune System - decreased resistance to infections and neoplasm (tumours).
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