Do you have school age kids

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  • AdrienneKaren
    AdrienneKaren Posts: 168 Member
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    I know my daughter spends a set amount of time running during each PE class. Her puts together fast beat songs to keep the kids going. I think they focus on being pretty active during PE. That makes me happy. They did do the parachute thing yesterday that doesn't require much other than standing. I remember being distracted by the pretty colors. :)
  • MB_Positif
    MB_Positif Posts: 8,897 Member
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    It sounds hit or miss at my son's school. He's in kindergarten, they have it once every 6 days and they definitely haven't really played any sports, but they have done some games where they are up and moving around he said they've done push ups, etc. I have a feeling gym class is just going to be phased out. It'll be up to us to determine our children's phsical activity. I am trying to do my part by asking my son to try some workout DVD's with me. He's gone jogging with me a few times and even done a 1 mile race :) The other day he wanted to jog on the treadmill and lift weights. I have to keep a tight leash on that stuff though, since he is still pretty young and small!!!
  • NKF92879
    NKF92879 Posts: 601 Member
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    I just wanted to say that I think if kids are going to have to take a gym class then they should be doing "real" exercise. Why put something like cup stacking during the physical fitness part of the day? I would like to see kids do more physical activities. Why not have them do a real workout geared towards their age group...or play real sports that burn calories? Lets teach them young about how to stay fit and active.

    Any thoughts??

    In most states, PE standards include fine motor skills. That would be where the cup stacking comes in. Physical Education is about more than exercise.
  • wells0707
    wells0707 Posts: 251 Member
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    My son is in middle school (6th grade) in Illinois and the class is doing the P90X workout! I coudln't believe it when he told me that. They have gym 7/8 of the school year, with the other 1/8 being a session of Health. Their gym teacher has made them run a mile, climb a wall, do circuit training, etc. My son is very action-oriented but complains it is too hard....

    Wow! Thats awesome. That does sound intense for an ordinary kid, but its right along the lines of what we need. :)
  • wells0707
    wells0707 Posts: 251 Member
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    I have no complaints about the high school gym curriculum here. My daughter does alot of varieties of sports and health education. Its more junior high and elementary school that disapoints me. I just feel with the growing number of obese children..and the number of people on this site even that it would be great to nip this problem in the bud.

    Lets teach our children the correct way to exercise. Let them complain a little. There are plenty of fun games to play that get you moving. I think it would be great to get kids into staying active and erase the fitness myths that we all learn so young.
  • IndigoVA
    IndigoVA Posts: 164 Member
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    My daughter is in kindergarten, and I was pretty shocked to find out that she only has gym twice a week. Even in gym class, they rarely do anything too physically active. The only real physical activity they get is daily recess, and that only lasts for 10-15 minutes. So yes, I definitely think they need more physical activity, especially for young school-aged children. What bothers me even more, is that every school fundraiser is revolved around selling cookie dough, selling candies, pizza parties, ice cream parties, etc. It's as though they're constantly promoting unhealthy food. For the 100th day of school this week, the teacher gave each child a bag with 100 pieces of candy in it. Seriously! My daughter is actually very thin, but no 5 year old needs 100 pieces of candy!
  • cmhickey616
    cmhickey616 Posts: 85 Member
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    Honestly, coming from someone who had to do PE for her whole life in school (I just graduated college), it is kind of a joke to the kids (at least all the kids I knew). I still agree that it should be part of the required curriculum because if kids don't have healthy parents they need to learn about health/physical activity somewhere, but basically everything I learned I learned from my parents setting a healthy examples (my mom is an aerobics nut and my dad does triathalons). I love working out and taking care of myself, but I despised PE from kindergarten until my senior year of high school. I even took an extra "advanced health" course to get out of PE my senior year. Especially when you're a girl in high school you don't want to do a workout at 11 am when you have to be in school until 3 pm. Plus, in junior high, my memories of PE consisted of our morbidly obese gym teachers riding around in golf carts yelling at us to run faster and have a healthy happy heart. It's really all about taking the time as a parent to set a healthy example for your kids rather than relying on PE. I agree with you that it would be awesome if kids could get a real workout in, but that's really not the reality especially for older kids. My workouts came after school when I ran cross country.

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