Let’s talk about Juul...in Biology class.

by guest bloggers Jess Lemieux and Mike Abbott, science teachers at CVUHS.

“I used to Juul for about a year, nonstop. Sometimes I would feel super sick but I never had a problem with it until we started this unit. At first, I was really upset and kinda mad (because of the withdrawal symptoms). But I’ve been six weeks clean and I honestly have never felt better.” Student, 16

Type “vape” into your Google search bar and your screen will flood with recent headlines about the teen vaping epidemic. The first article that popped up today, “Teens don’t vape, they Juul, Making E-Cigarette Use Hard to Track,” highlights the fact that teens are speaking a different language (as they have since the beginning of time). If we are afraid to learn their language, we risk miscommunication. This is fine if we’re talking about fashion, but dangerous when talking about health.

In December of this school year, we decided to talk about Juuling in our Integrated Biology course, a tenth grade, heterogeneous class. We had noticed high levels of compliance in our classes, but wondered how to spark true engagement. While they clearly enjoyed class and respected us as teachers, we realized we were not allowing them to apply science to their lives. To tackle this we looked for a way to teach our required content (e.g. circulatory system, respiratory system, etc.) through a more relevant and engaging lens. Enter juuling. We quickly realized that as science educators we could facilitate an investigation of teen nicotine use from a scientific lens, free of judgment, but in order to do this effectively, students would need a safe place to talk.

Many approaches to teen issues employ scare tactics that extensively highlight the negative aspects associated with the topic in hopes that it will deter kids from making unhealthy choices. (Some of us are old enough to remember Reefer Madness). These scare tactics may work if teens are weighing their options in a safe place with adults they care about. Most teenagers are capable of the same mature, logical thought as adults when they are acting in a state of “cold cognition,” which means they are in the absence of peer interactions or pressure. Ask a kid if they want to Juul in these moments and they will likely say, “No, it’s so bad for you.” However, in the state of “hot cognition,” when the adolescent is in the middle of the social pressure, stress, and anxiety of high school, their answer may be very different. In these situations, the limbic system of the adolescent brain overrides the underdeveloped prefrontal cortex, which leads teens to make quick and irrational decisions. One student wrote, “In sophomore year, as school was getting more difficult I was just kind of fed up so the next time I was with a friend and they told me about how de-stressing Juul is, I tried it. I also simply do it to fit in.”

Failing to recognize, understand and talk about the reasons that lead teenagers to use nicotine is a general trend across the country, and knowing this is eventually what led us to our “Science of Teenage Vaping” unit. When we began to design, we decided to go big right out of the gate and host a 200-student kick-off. The sole purpose was for students to answer two questions: How do you talk about it, and why do you do it? We asked students to break into small groups and come up with a list of words/phrases that they use to talk about vaping. The world cloud below is the product generated via that work. Look very closely, right between the words “vape” and “Juul” and you will see the word “addiction” in very small print. For the adults in the room, this was eye-opening. Not only did we recognize that there is an entire language surrounding teen nicotine use that we are completely unaware of (e.g. nick, stick, rip, juice), but teens are oblivious to the consequences of their actions.

The next question students answered was, why do you do it? After some time consolidating their thoughts they came up with the following reasons: peer pressure, marketing, family modeling, coping strategy, and addiction. These reasons and the science behind them became the foundational knowledge of our unit curriculum, along with the skills of Making Scientific Claims, Using Evidence and Scientific Reasoning.

We spent the next six weeks guiding students through investigations and analyses of the factors that lead to nicotine use through the lens of the teenage brain. We designed target-based practice activities and assessments that focused on immediate and long term physiological effects of nicotine use (at the molecular, cellular and system level), the factors that contribute to addiction and its development (tolerance, withdrawal, conditioning) and the specific marketing of Juul to teens. In doing this, students used rigorous, engaging, student-driven content to develop transferable skills.

Demonstrating Learning

At the end of the unit, students wrote an essay (using Claim, Evidence, and Reasoning) to respond to one of the following prompts:

• Are the risks of Juuling worth the rewards?
• Is adolescent nicotine use really something we should be concerned about?
• Do personal freedoms trump public health?

Students had already developed the skill of Making Scientific Claims independently throughout the first part of the year so we felt we had solid data regarding each student’s level of mastery. Because of this we encouraged them to work together to write claims. The video shows two groups engaging in this process.

We also had a handful of students choose to rewrite our school Juuling policy as an alternative. Regardless of the format, the skill assessment was the same. Students needed to choose a claim, support all parts of their claim with reliable and specific evidence from a provided resource document, and use their content knowledge to provide scientific reasoning. The results were fantastic! Students who had previously struggled with engagement found themselves “in the zone,” writing multiple pages and reaching the target or going beyond on the class scales. However, it was the student reflections that confirmed our choice to take this risk in curriculum redesign for our students.

“I think it is extremely important for me to understand how the teenage brain makes decisions because now I can have a different view on my peers who choose to Juul. Obviously, I never thought they were “bad people” but I know that the environment they are in (inside and outside of school) impacts their decisions. I will know to be thoughtful of the issues people may be facing in their daily lives that will make them want to Juul.”

“I realize why people act differently when they are surrounded by different types of people, which is cool!” 

“Thanks for breaking the walls and the stigma regarding this hard issue!” 

“One aspect that made learning about the negative impacts of Juuling especially hard was knowing that many people I am close with have this addiction. By learning about negative impacts I am learning about bad things that are happening to them.

“Learning about Juuling has made me more nervous for my younger siblings and the choices the will have to make. Have I prepared/equipped them with enough information? According to this unit, no. I need to talk to them more.”

“This information was important to me to understand because both of my parents smoked and my grandma smoked up until she died. Her death was an effect of smoking almost her entire life.”

“My older sister said “I just don’t understand why people would inhale nicotine. It’s so bad for you.” I had a thing or two to say in response to that. I told her all of these complex scientific processes that lead to nicotine addiction and in the brain that I didn’t even realize I knew! She was impressed!”

“I think it was better than learning about the systems and what the do, which would be pretty boring, even though I don’t Juul.”

So, where do we go from here? One thing is certain, we will definitely be teaching this unit again next year, but we hope to broaden the scope to focus on other addictions. As one student wrote, “I think we should do more with weed and booze because that will help a lot of kids with choices in the future.” I guess some language hasn’t changed!