Exersise Improves Kids Academics
January 4, 2009 by Brian Crosby
From the “I Told You So Department” comes this article and studies:
Exercise Improves Kids’ Academics, by Dan Peterson, LiveScience’s Sports Columnist
I’ll let the article mostly speak for itself but will post this one telling quote:
“Ironically, one of the solutions proposed for raising test scores, the federal No Child Left Behind program, encourages schools to focus more of the school day on the core academic subjects while reducing class time in peripheral subjects, like art, music, and physical education. In fact, only 6 percent of American high schools offer a daily gym class. Yet a 2002 Virginia Tech study showed no relationship between reduced class time in those subjects and higher overall standardized tests.”
I told you so! : )
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Thank you Brian for pointing out what should be blindingly obvious. I had a co-worker move to Florida where in a fit of testing frenzy, the eliminated all recess periods in elementary school.
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I was a volunteer in a 4th grade classroom a few years ago. One thing that surprised me was that the teacher did not allow her students to go outside for afternoon recess – her rationale was that it took too much time to go up and down the stairs to the playground and most of the time was wasted doing this. She allowed them to “play” in the classroom (board games) during this time. I never understood her feeling that time was wasted so, therefore, what was the point of going outside. I also noticed that students’ attention spans waned greatly by the end of the day. I am not saying that not letting them outside for that 10-15 minutes would have made a huge difference but I do believe that the outside time would have been valuable to the students. They need that time to “get the wiggles out” and clear their minds. How can we expect a child to be able to stay focused for 2-3 hours without a break from the classroom? As a student myself, and obviously not in elementary school, I can’t focus for that long without getting up for a quick break.
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Katherine – In addition, the neighborhoods around the schools that are the most likely to cut recess (at risk schools) are too often deemed too dangerous to have kids play in after-school. So the little chance students have to interact and learn social skills is diminished. They are also less likely to be in sports programs.
Brian
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