 It's close. You get to do different things. You get Mississippi. It makes me feel good. It's such a positive method of working with students. They can pull from the resources of their souls almost. The earlier we start, the better it's going to be. And by pulling the arts into it, we're going to have visual displays for the anti-drug program. Mule's Reflecting Prevention Project uses the universal language of the arts to involve students in an exciting learning experience focused on the prevention of alcohol, tobacco and other drug use. With guidance from this film and the accompanying materials, educators and community leaders across the country are helping students learn to say no to drug use as they work together to create Mule's Reflecting Prevention. Before we begin, we like to think about the choices we make. How do we make these choices? What kinds of things influence us and how we do what we do? Preparation involves developing and presenting a drug prevention lesson. Selecting a theme and working with the students to apply the theme to the mural. I think it would be your peers too because it would be called peer pressure. They try to talk you into something that you really don't want to do. Every day, young people are exposed to a lot of risk factors. But let's think about some ways that we can work to prevent some people from using drugs. Like for me, I use art to get away from certain things. So you're building some good life skills right now that you can work with. It is important to focus on positive prevention messages. Messages that give students ideas and alternatives to help them resist drug use. Positive value judgment and about what you think is right and wrong. Okay. Well, I feel that the future is more important than one moment. I mean, the rest of my life to be happy, I don't need drugs to be happy for one second. It's not worth it to me to risk my life. Okay. Who can tell me what a mural is? Yeah. It's a picture showing an idea, a meaning which many people work together making it. Excellent. Excellent. Can anybody think of a theme we can use for our mural today about alcohol, tobacco, and other drug prevention? Yes. You could, like, put people doing healthy things, not smoking or something like playing baseball or football or running. What are some of the healthy behaviors that you learned in your assembly recently? Healthy habits and activities. Exercise and keeping in shape. Reading, playing sports, reading music and dancing. Okay. Now, let's discuss the themes that we're going to use and how they relate to substance abuse and preventative measures. Role models are developing positive bonds and the last theme is healthy alternatives to drug use. How do you visualize the mural? We could have, like, people playing sports and riding lights and exercising instead of doing drugs and drinking. Very good. Mikey, what do you think? We could make it colorful. I use a lot of bright colors so everybody can see it and it'll be attractive to people. Very good. I think we could use some pictures and words. Good. Good. How about you, Terry? We can make the words in big bubble letters so everybody can see it perfectly. All right. We've been working with creative problem-solving techniques to come up with some good ideas for each of the murals. You're going to be working four foot by eight foot. So you maybe want to repeat an item or a color. You want to make sure that you have a balance of all parts. You then will have a harmonious and unified composition. Now the fun begins. Abuse it and put it in. Put it in. Put it in. A wide variety of materials and techniques can be used to create permanent or portable murals. No supplies out of the ordinary were used, so it was really easy. Basically, we've used temper paints, a little bit of acrylic, and some papers that we have in the classroom. We tried to focus on one big focal point that when you look at it, it's going to catch your eye. We used many different colors because when you use drugs and alcohol, you're not going to get many colors. Over here, we're going to have a role model holding up an umbrella over a person so that you can see that people, when it starts to rain or when it looks bad, they can look up to their role models. Anybody could work with this project. Simple projects could be done at each of the students' desks and then collage together at the end so a classroom teacher could do it in a limited environment. The project promotes team teaching and collaboration. Teachers from all disciplines can work together, spreading the prevention message across the curriculum. I think it's wonderful. It gives you an opportunity to not only just work with one another, but learn their teaching style, gain something from them and be able to share. I teach first grade and I'm not an art teacher. It's wonderful to be able to bring the love of art into the first grade class. This project can be used with students from all ages. I think a non-art teacher, particularly social studies teacher, a science teacher, health teachers, could use it as a follow-up as part of training in their classroom on drug prevention. By having the students work together in small groups, cooperation comes in. It's a lot of fun working with others. You can get a lot more done. Everyone has different ideas and we have to work together to put all our ideas together. I see many benefits for students working in a collaborative method. They're pulling their resources and using talents and skills from each student. Give up some of your ideas for somebody else's ideas and put them together. By cooperating with each other, they're going to build on each other's ideas. It's fun because if you get everybody doing it together, it really starts to blend in and look nice so everybody's happy about what they draw and did. It plus gives you a good feeling. If you work together, you can get a lot accomplished, especially getting this message out. The involvement of parents in all aspects of the project is encouraged. I just think it's so important for parents to participate with the schools to encourage their children to do more positive things and to stay away from drugs. Well, Angela has just become a new person since she's been involved in the arts. It's been a wonderful means of self-expression. She's developed confidence. I'm here today because of her. She insisted that I come and get involved. I think it's nice when people work together and try to make something up like something like this. You get to see the final product. It turns out more than you could expect because in the beginning it's just a little sketch on a piece of paper. There are many opportunities for parents, family, friends, and others to participate in the celebration of the completed murals. We did these murals today to tell people about not to use drugs. Our mural is trying to show that you can help somebody else. The theme is that when a person can look towards a role model they can see places that they can head in the future and that they can realize that if they take drugs they won't be able to achieve what their role model has achieved. Public display of murals and community involvement increases the effectiveness of the prevention message. And it's great fun for the students as they take pride in sharing their work. You should put it like at a museum so where everybody comes to see it so you could send the matches out. Somewhere where kids could see it and be encouraged by it. On our walls around the school so the whole school would get the message and they could tell other people about it. Somewhere where a lot of people are going to see it especially people who need the encouragement. You can do it anywhere. You can do it on the side of a wall. You could make one big giant mural and if you want to come paint on it you just tell the whole community to come and just draw your own picture. My students really enjoyed working on the murals. As a principal it's a wonderful experience for our children and teachers to work together on a topic of interest that is very valuable for our kids and for society in general. Because art is like a visual that you can rely on. It gives you a picture in your mind. It makes everything become more realistic. It makes it very visually there. It's something that then the school can see for years to come. You just need creativity and everybody has creativity. It's a natural way to express yourself.