Worksheets and No Prep Teaching Resources Reading Comprehension Worksheets Healthy Life

What Does Health Really Mean? Healthy Life

---

What Does Health Really Mean?
Print What Does Health Really Mean? Reading Comprehension with Sixth Grade Work

Print What Does Health Really Mean? Reading Comprehension


Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 6 to 8
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	7.63

Vocabulary

challenging words:

injury-causing, sexual, definitive, society, teen, gender, poorly, abuse, heredity, factor, maintain, violent, alcohol, leading, pregnancy, unplanned

---

What Does Health Really Mean? By Jennifer Kenny

---

¹     What do you think of when someone says he or she is healthy? Most people would answer that question by saying they are not sick. That usually means they are free from disease. Today, though, health needs to take into account lifestyle choices as well as the presence or absence of infection. What does that mean?
 
²     In the 1800s, most people died from infections that were passed from person to person. These infections included polio, tuberculosis, the flu, and pneumonia. Therefore, when a person said he was healthy, it meant he wasn't suffering from an infection.
 
³     Today most of these infections are under control because of advances in medicine and prevention. Many of the factors that affect our health nowadays are lifestyle choices. Lifestyle diseases, such as some kinds of diabetes, heart disease, and cancer, are huge health problems in our society. They are caused partly by unhealthy actions and partly by other things.
 
⁴     There are risk factors associated with any health problem. What are risk factors? Risk factors are things that increase your chances of injury, disease, or any other health problem. There are different kinds of risk factors. Some are controllable; others are not. The difference between the two is obvious.

Paragraphs 5 to 15:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable

---

Weekly Reading Books

Create Weekly Reading Books Prepare for an entire week at once!

---

Feedback on What Does Health Really Mean?

Leave your feedback on What Does Health Really Mean?   (use this link if you found an error in the story)

---

Healthy Life

Healthy Life

---

Health

Alcohol         Bicycle Safety         Circulatory System         Digestive System         Disabilities         Drugs         Excretory System         Food Pyramid         Health Professionals         Healthy Life         Hygiene         Illnesses         Medical Tools

Miscellaneous Health Topics         Muscular System         My Plate         Nervous System         Nutrition         Reproductive System         Respiratory System         Skeletal System         Teeth         The Five Senses         The Human Body         Tobacco

Copyright © 2025 edHelper