Students at Phan Chau Trinh High School during a lesson about e-cigarettes. Photo: THU HA.
Reforming teaching methods stems from a desire to protect students.
Outperforming thousands of other presentations, the team of authors Pham Kim Phuc, Dinh Ha Thuong, and Vo Nguyen Quynh Trang from the Biology Department of Phan Chau Trinh High School (Hai Chau Ward) excellently won first prize in the high school category. Mr. Pham Kim Phuc, representing the team, shared that the teachers participated in the competition with the desire to help students clearly identify issues related to tobacco, especially new forms of tobacco that are infiltrating the school environment.
Therefore, when designing the lesson, the team aimed to help students understand e-cigarettes correctly and comprehensively so that they could say "no" to them. The teacher used various scenarios to guide students, helping them analyze what makes them susceptible to being influenced, thereby developing self-protective skills. Thanks to the lively delivery, the lesson was positively received by the students.
The winning team from Phan Chau Trinh High School (Hai Chau Ward) won first prize. Photo: Provided by the team.
Winning third prize overall, Mr. Ngo Lu Thanh, a chemistry teacher at Son Tra High School (An Hai ward), chose to integrate the topic into his experiential learning and career guidance sessions for his homeroom students. He observed that students today have easy access to e-cigarettes, and the trend is becoming increasingly younger, but they lack a full understanding of the dangers. Many students use them simply out of curiosity or to follow a trend.
Driven by this concern, Mr. Thanh developed his lesson plan based on the idea of a "virtual clinic," where students transform into "young doctors" analyzing the chemicals in cigarette smoke and their effects on the body. The lesson begins with a short play, "Just One Puff..." – the story of a student hospitalized due to e-cigarette use, which evokes emotion and captures attention. Then, through scenarios, games, group discussions, and role-playing activities, students are trained intellectually, emotionally, and practically. According to Mr. Thanh, such lessons have led to a significant transformation in students' awareness and problem-solving skills.
At the junior high school level, with her third-prize winning design, Ms. Luong Doan Phuong, an English teacher at Huynh Thuc Khang Junior High School (Thanh Khe ward), observed that junior high school students are very curious and like to express themselves, making them easily attracted to new trends, including e-cigarettes. Ms. Phuong's goal in developing her lesson plan was to create content that is relatable, visually appealing, and age-appropriate to help students understand the harmful effects of tobacco. Her lesson plan utilizes many modern teaching methods, combining real-life videos , illustrative images, scenarios, and diverse application exercises such as multiple-choice questions, music, fill-in-the-blanks, and situational questions. The combination of accurate content and lively format helps students actively absorb, easily remember, and deeply understand the issue.
Develop a standardized set of documents, updated annually.
According to teacher Ngo Lu Thanh, the key to helping students become "immune" to tobacco is early education in awareness and social reflex skills. When students understand the mechanism of addiction, the harms, and know how to refuse, they will have natural "resistance." Besides classroom learning, schools need to organize regular, long-term thematic awareness activities; cooperate with families and apply technology to monitor and support students who violate the rules in a humane way, helping them correct their mistakes instead of just punishing them.
Ms. Luong Doan Phuong (second from the left) and Mr. Ngo Lu Thanh (sixth from the left) receive the third prize at the awards ceremony. Photo: Provided by the interviewee.
Emphasizing the importance of correct awareness and life skills, Ms. Phuong said that education on preventing and combating e-cigarette use needs to be implemented comprehensively, such as strengthening integrated teaching, using visual aids, telling real-life stories, and collaborating with organizations and parents to create a multi-layered protection network. "We hope the education sector and relevant agencies will provide more official and regularly updated materials so that teachers have accurate reference sources," Ms. Phuong said.
Sharing the same viewpoint, Mr. Pham Kim Phuc believes that schools should consider educating about the harmful effects of e-cigarettes as a regular task, not just a campaign. This would involve strengthening coordination with parents, healthcare facilities, and organizations to ensure early detection, early counseling, and the development of clear yet humane handling procedures. Most importantly, it would help students develop self-awareness and critical thinking skills to remain vigilant against the temptation of new tobacco products. The authors hope that the education sector will develop a standardized, unified set of materials, updated annually, specifically for schools, along with guidelines for implementation in teaching and experiential activities. Simultaneously, training courses are needed for teachers, especially homeroom teachers, to confidently implement tobacco prevention content in the school environment.
The 2025 lesson plan design competition on "Preventing and Combating the Harmful Effects of Tobacco, E-cigarettes, and Heated Tobacco" attracted over 6,800 entries from secondary school teachers nationwide. The organizing committee awarded 38 individual prizes and 10 team prizes (across both junior and senior high school levels). In this year's competition, Da Nang won two team prizes: the City Department of Education and Training won second prize, and Huynh Thuc Khang Junior High School won third prize; and four individual prizes: one first prize and one third prize in the senior high school category; and one third prize and one consolation prize in the junior high school category.
Source: https://baodanang.vn/lan-toa-nhan-thuc-phong-chong-tac-hai-thuoc-la-3311278.html
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