February 12th, 2013
Here at Creative Smiles we believe that Prevention is better than cure! Therefore we feel that it is important to educate children, parents of young children, nursery school staff, child minders and everyone we can on good oral hygiene measures!
My name is Leanne and I am Creative Smiles Patient Care Co-ordinator. I am also a qualified Oral Health Educator and regularly visit St Therese Nursery School as well as many other Community Groups delivering lessons on how to achieve a healthy smile for life!
I believe that targeting children at this young age along with those who care for them really can make an important difference from early on.
Over my 13 years of delivering oral Health it is refreshing to now see the positive changes that have been made within nursery’s and schools with their new healthy eating programmes and advise on oral hygiene now being involved within the curriculum. Going out to see Children who had never even seen a toothbrush before, I can happily say seems to be a thing of the past!!
To-day I visited groups of 3 and 4 year old Children at St Therese Pre-School Belfast. Their lesson plan involved a story about visiting the Dentist (this involved some dressing up which the kids really enjoyed!) My aim was to get them to realise how important that their Smile is to them and how they can help look after it for life.
We also focused on Twice Daily Tooth brushing with Fluoride Toothpaste along with a ‘Smart Snack’ shopping game which helps them to identify food and drink types that damage their teeth!
Even though I returned to the Surgery exhausted I had a fantastic Morning working alongside the lovely staff and children at the Nursery!