Making Healthy Relationship Education Approachable at JHMS

How does CSN engage Jackson Hole Middle Schoolers in approachable, fun healthy relationship education? 

Community Safety Network’s star advocate at Jackson Hole Middle School is an educational wizard when it comes to making a hard or scary subject fun and engaging. Michelle Rooks has been teaching for more than 30 years and is CSN’s partner in all things Jackson Hole Middle School. Michelle helps us run the Dating 101 club, and tenaciously ensures that healthy relationship and consent education are ubiquitous at Jackson Hole Middle School. 

In Dating 101, we use One Love’s 10 signs of a healthy relationship and 10 signs of an unhealthy relationship to introduce and discuss relationships in plain language students can easily understand. We discuss examples in teen relationships – romantic and friendships – of every sign so that students know how to recognize the signs in real life.  

10 Signs of a Healthy Relationship

(You can also view this PDF from One Love Foundation)

1. Comfortable Pace: The relationship moves at a speed that feels enjoyable for both. 
2. Trust: Confidence that your partner won’t intentionally hurt you or the relationship. 
3. Honesty: You can be truthful and candid without fearing the other person’s reaction. 
4. Independence: You have space to be yourself and maintain your own life outside the relationship. 
5. Respect: You value each other’s beliefs, opinions, and boundaries. 
6. Equality: The relationship feels balanced, with equal effort from both partners. 
7. Kindness: You are caring and empathetic, providing mutual comfort and support. 
8. Taking Responsibility: Owning your actions and words, and apologizing for mistakes. 
9. Healthy Conflict: Disagreements are handled openly and respectfully without judgment. 
10. Fun: You genuinely enjoy spending time together and bring out the best in each other. 

10 Signs of an Unhealthy Relationship 

1. Intensity: Relationships that move too fast, or behaviors that are overwhelming, extreme, or obsessive. 
2. Possessiveness: Jealousy that becomes controlling, limiting who you see or what you do. 
3. Manipulation: Attempts to control your emotions or actions, often through passive-aggressive behavior. 
4. Isolation: Being kept away from friends, family, or support systems. 
5. Sabotage: Purposefully ruining your reputation, achievements, or success. 
6. Belittling: Saying or doing things that make you feel bad about yourself or inadequate. 
7. Guilting: Making you feel responsible for your partner’s actions, happiness, or mental state. 
8. Volatility: Unpredictable, intense reactions that make you walk on eggshells to avoid outbursts. 
9. Deflecting Responsibility: Making excuses for toxic behavior, blaming you, or refusing to take accountability. 
10. Betrayal: Acts of dishonesty, disloyalty, or acting differently when you are not around. 

After a recent 8th grade assembly, we found that 100% of Jackson Hole Middle School 8th graders can recognize the above signs of healthy and unhealthy relationships. Plain language and consistency in our messaging make this high level of understanding and recognition possible. We also make it FUN!

Though every student understands that unhealthy and abusive relationships don’t feel good, we also find ways to make relationship education fun and approachable. For example, 8th graders at Jackson Hole Middle Schoolers recently created this bamboozled activity to help educate the entire school on healthy and unhealthy relationships. Students in advisories competed against each other to see who could correctly match the most words to their definitions. The advisory with the most correct answers won Smarties for being such smarties!

Check out the bamboozled to see what Jackson Hole Middle Schoolers know about healthy and unhealthy relationships.