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This fall my local town opened a new middle school for grades 6-8.
As you might guess, the school is beautiful with wonderful landscaping
and shiny new classrooms.
I have the pleasure of supervising a student teacher at this new
school later this semester and I must admit I am excited to see
the new building because in a few short years my own children will
be attending the school. A concern I have, however, is whether or
not the teachers at this new school will receive the support they
need for a new physical education program to match the new school.
Or will they, as I suspect, still be subject to overcrowded gymnasiums,
poor equipment, and too little support for teaching health education.
The State of Virginia (like many states) has focused a great deal
of resources on standardized achievement tests…known as the
Standards of Learning (or SOLs). And while standards of been written
for both physical and health education, student achievement of those
standards is not currently assessed with the rigor associated with
Math, English, Reading, History, and Social Studies. Thus, when
principals see poor test scores in the above mentioned core academic
areas, you can only imagine who takes the hit. Resources are spent
on the areas assessed…not those such as PE and/or Health.
Of course, I am not naïve enough to believe that simply by having
mandated tests will somehow PE & Health “climb out of
the basement of academia.”
Jon Poole
Secondary Section Editor
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| Web-Based Resource = BAM! |
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BAM! is brought to you by The Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention (CDC), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health
and Human Services (DHHS). BAM! was created to answer kids'
questions on health issues and recommend ways to make their bodies
and minds healthier, stronger, and safer. BAM! also serves
as an aid to teachers, providing them with interactive activities
to support their health and science curriculums that are educational
and fun.
About the Teacher's Corner
BAM! offers current, credible, and applicable interactive
content that your students can use to investigate health and science
topics for school, as well as on their own. We also planned the
site to be a resource for teachers who would like to incorporate
the health topics covered on the site in their classrooms.
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Because financial support
for fitness programs is the schools is unlikely to increase in
the foreseeable future, and television is unlikely to become less
attractive, we must anticipate the probability that our children’s
degree of fitness will decline. Pediatricians must acquaint themselves
with this problem and appeal to their local school boards to maintain,
if not increase, the schools’ physical education program
of physical fitness. School programs should emphasize the so-called
lifetime athletic activities such as cycling, swimming, and tennis.
Schools should decrease time spent teaching the skills used in
team sports such as football, basketball, and baseball. Physical
fitness activities at school should promote a lifelong habit of
aerobic exercise.
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| Promoting our "Physical Best" |
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The American Fitness Alliance (a collaborative effort between AAHPERD,
the Cooper Institute for Aerobics Research, and Human Kinetics)
publisher of the Physical Best materials including the Physical
Education for Lifelong Fitness: The Physical Best Teacher’s
Guide and the Physical Best Activity Guide: Secondary Level,
provides secondary teachers some pretty strong resources to get
the year started on a healthy note.
What are the Physical Best principles for effective health-related
physical education?
All Physical Best materials, resources, and workshops:
- emphasize enjoyable participation in developmentally appropriate
physical activities,
- offer a diverse range of noncompetitive and competitive activities
appropriate for different ages and abilities, allowing students
to successfully participate,
- emphasize the personal nature of participation in lifelong physical
activity,
- provide appropriate and authentic assessment that is part of
the learning process and is designed so students take on increasing
responsibility for their own assessment,
- follow proven educational sequences and progressions that lead
to students taking on increasing responsibility for their own
health-related fitness, and
- meet the NASPE National Physical Education Standards for health-related
fitness.
Check it out through the American Fitness Alliance.
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In our view, tax-paying
adults are convinced, on the one hand, that children need exercise,
that they should develop reasonable levels of fitness, and that
they should master fundamental motor skills. Yet, on the other hand,
these same tax-payers appear skeptical that school physical education
is contributing much to these goals. We suspect that this skepticism
is fueled by the largely negative recollections that many adults
have of their own experience in physical education. We fear that
many adults associate physical education with embarrassment, pain,
boredom, triviality, and irrelevance.
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The Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR
), which is produced by the Center for Disease Control (CDC),
released 2 important reports in August.
The first report included the results of a study that examined
the transportation modes of children who lived very close to their
school. The results indicated that only 19% of Georgia school
children who live within one mile of school travel to school by
walking. The CDC supports walking to school through the KidsWalk-to-School
program. This program was developed in response to the low rates
of walking to school, inadequate levels of physical activity levels
of children, and the alarming increase of overweight children
in the U.S.
The second report identified common barriers that children face
children when walking or biking to school. Nationally, only about
14% of school aged children walk or bike to school. Parents do
not encourage these healthy behaviors primarily due to traffic
danger and long distances. Unfortunately, most children
who live close to school, (within one mile), still do not walk
or bike to school. The CDC recommends that concerned community
leaders and parents work together to address these barriers. Creating
safe routes for children to walk and bike to school can help produce
healthier children.
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| If you have ideas, comments, letters
to share, or questions about particular topics, please email
one of the following Secondary Section Editors: |
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| Encouraging Words and Verbs |
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The White House is getting into the fitness act with several web
sites dedicated to enhancing the health and fitness of our nation’s
youth. Sites include the Healthier Us site above and the new Verb:
It's What You Do site below.
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What Constitutes a Quality Physical Education Program?
The National Association for Sport and Physical Education (NASPE)
believes that every student in our nation's schools, from kindergarten
through grade 12, should have the opportunity to participate in
quality physical education. It is the unique role of quality physical
education programs to develop the health-related fitness, physical
competence, and cognitive understanding about physical activity
for all students so that they can adopt healthy and physically active
lifestyles. Today's quality physical education programs are important
because they provide learning experiences that meet the developmental
needs of youngsters, which help improve a child's mental alertness,
academic performance, readiness to learn and enthusiasm for learning.
According to NASPE guidelines, a high quality physical education
program includes the following components: opportunity to learn,
meaningful content and appropriate instruction.
Opportunity to Learn:
- Instructional periods totaling 150 minutes per week (elementary)
and 225 minutes per week (middle and secondary school)
- Qualified physical education specialist providing a developmentally
appropriate program
- Adequate equipment and facilities
Meaningful Content:
- Instruction in a variety of motor skills that are designed to
enhance the physical, mental, and social/emotional development
of every child
- Fitness education and assessment to help children understand,
improve and/or maintain their physical well-being
- Development of cognitive concepts about motor skill and fitness
- Opportunities to improve their emerging social and cooperative
skills and gain a multi-cultural perspective
- Promotion of regular amounts of appropriate physical activity
now and throughout life
Appropriate Instruction:
- Full inclusion of all students
- Maximum practice opportunities for class activities
- Well-designed lessons that facilitate student learning
- Out of school assignments that support learning and practice
- No physical activity for punishment
- Uses regular assessment to monitor and reinforce student learning
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