Episode 64: Exploring the Role and Controversy of Physical Education in K-12 Schools

Ever wondered why dodgeball is such a hot topic in K-12 education communities? Or how classrooms, filled with exercise balls and standing desks, may actually boost your child’s academic performance? Your curiosity ends here! Join me as I untangle the complexities around physical education in the school system, examining its critical role in a child's development and the controversy it sparks from playground games to innovative classroom alternatives. 

Listen closely as I discuss the disparities in physical education requirements across states and the significance of unstructured playtime for a child’s brain.  You'll learn how physical education can foster self-regulation, mastery goals, and a positive learning environment. Finally, I explore innovative ways to incorporate physical activity in classrooms and address potential barriers to these methods. Remember, it’s not just about physical activity; it's about promoting a learning mindset. Strap in for this enlightening discourse as I make sense of all things physical education in K-12 schools.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:56

Welcome to another episode of K-12 Education Untangled. My name is Dr Kim Fields, former corporate manager turned educational researcher and advocate, and I'm the host of this podcast. I got into this space after dealing with some frustrating interactions with school educators and administrators, as well as experiencing the micro discriminations that I faced. As an African American mom raising my two kids, who were in the public school system, I really wanted to understand how teachers were trained and what the research provided about the challenges of the public education system. Once I gained the information and the insights that I needed, I was then equipped to be able to successfully support my children in their educational progress. If you're looking to find out more about current information and issues in education that could affect you or your children, then you're in the right place. Thanks for tuning in today. I know that staying informed about K-12 education trends and topics is important to you, so keep listening.

Speaker 1: 2:08

On today's episode, I'll be discussing whether your children are getting enough physical education in school. The subject of physical education, or PE, brings back certain memories. For most of us, it was a required part of the curriculum when we were growing up. However, these days, there are a fair number of students who opt out of PE to take part in substitution activities, most of which have fewer benefits than good, old-fashioned physical education. I discussed the academic benefits of physical education and movement, some controversies around certain childhood games played during PE and action steps that you can take if your child isn't getting enough exercise at school. On this episode, let's get started.

Speaker 1: 3:05

Most states in this country require schools to provide students with physical education in elementary, middle school and high school. There are ways around this requirement. The main workaround is allowing for exemptions, waivers and substitutions that permit students to satisfy the physical education requirement in alternative ways, which basically reduces the effectiveness of this mandated requirement. As of 2012, 33 states permit schools to allow students to substitute other activities for their required physical education. Only 60% of states require elementary schools to provide recess, which is unfortunate because unstructured playtime serves a dual purpose for younger students because it gives them a necessary brain break and allows them to get more physical activity.

Speaker 1: 4:08

Stress can impact learning and physical education in a way that helps to relieve the body of stress. Children are basically built to play. They go on the playground, release some stress, then they come back and they're ready to learn. Resets is typically about 20 minutes, which is insufficient for adequate physical exercise. Boosting a student's physical activity time has important implications. It helps to provide connection with peers as well as allow more creativity in learning their academic subjects. Increased exercise helps to alleviate anxiety, and this anxiety came about during the pandemic, when social isolation was in place, which greatly affected teenagers especially. Federal guidelines recommend that adolescents get an hour a day of exercise that minimally includes moderate or high intensity aerobic activity, such as running, dancing and activities along that sort, at least three days a week. For those types of activities, the activity also includes muscle strengthening, such as using weights three days a week, and bone strengthening, such as resistance exercises three days a week. Is your child's physical education program meeting these requirements?

Speaker 1: 5:46

Organized sports may be an important component in ensuring sufficient physical activity, which is an important aspect of general health and well-being, especially for 8 to 12 year old children. Physical exercise lessons have a significant potential for development of cognitive independence, especially for high school students, because these lessons are designed to form discipline, responsibility, perseverance, purposefulness, functional capabilities of the body, movement culture and independence. In the classroom, physical education is widely seen as an important subject for developing motor skills, as well as knowledge about healthy living. The learning aims of physical education include developing a competence in training, help, sportsmanship, cooperation with other students and applying effort to reach one's physical or sports goals. The learning activities in physical education often concentrate on learning through movement.

Speaker 1: 7:01

Self-regulated students set clear and realistic goals, use strategies to adjust their learning and reflect on the learning activity afterward. These are all part of self-regulated learning. A student's purpose of task engagement seems to influence their learning, especially if they are focusing on developing mastery of the task. These mastery goals are associated with positive outcomes, including effort, engagement and positive feelings. Task goals, in contrast, focus on performance and they tend to be linked to a negative set of processes and outcomes. Since much of the learning activities in physical education take place without a teacher in the immediate vicinity, being self-regulated is highly beneficial. In a PE class, there can be considerable differences between students as far as skill level is concerned. Therefore, pe teachers need to create a learning environment where everyone can set mastery goals according to their skill level, so that these can be accomplished by positive consequences for their self-regulation and performance. It's not just about providing physical activity for every student, but the focus should be on encouraging behaviors that promote learning. It is important to promote a student's self-regulation skills in their learning, the same way that they do practice these self-learning skills and self-regulation skills in their other school subjects.

Speaker 1: 8:44

There's a debate that surfaces every now and again over whether dodgeballs should be played in schools. This provocation usually comes from the media and it provokes polarizing arguments. The future of the game that is so popular that some students play and it has become a cultural touchstone for many Americans is a major point of division in some parts of the K-12 community. Opponents of the game argued that throwing things at other people is not a behavior that they would encourage for children. They also contend that dodgeball can lead to bullying, injury and, in some cases, lawsuits. On the other hand, dodgeball supporters fear that banning it, as some districts have done, is a sign of excessive coddling that creates lists that young adults are ill-prepared for the demands of the real world. Real injury can occur if the student is not adept physically to handle the movement required in the game. Bullying is generally only an issue if the game is not properly supervised.

Speaker 1: 10:05

Among the games students can play during physical education, dodgeball isn't the most rigorous activity. These days the ball is used in dodgeball and most schools is a foam ball instead of the red rubber ball that was used when my kids were growing up. Dodgeball isn't the only classic schoolyard game to come under scrutiny, however. In 2018, a document was accidentally circulated by the Alabama Education Department that proposed doing away with several elimination style games. According to local media, dodgeball was one of those games, and so was Musical Chairs and Duck Duck Goose. A school in Washington State even tried banning TAG at recess in 2015. There was pushback on both of these incidences, and the school and the State departments ended up backing off of their prohibitions.

Speaker 1: 11:09

Some K-12 classrooms across the country have exercise balls instead of chairs, standing desks instead of sitting desks, and movement is welcome even in math class. This classroom exercise equipment may also include bouncy bands, which are straps connected to desks so that students can stretch their feet back and forth while sitting, as well as exercise bikes. These types of classroom exercise equipment have been shown to be beneficial for students. The increasing trend to add kinesthetic or movement-based equipment to schools is part of the push to keep students active while learning. For example, a study by a researcher at Texas A&M University in 2016 showed that standing desks can improve an elementary student's body mass index. These researchers also found that third and fourth grade students who used the standing desks decreased their body mass index by an average percentage rate. Even students who spent one year without traditional desks had lower BMI's than those who sat. Exercise has been linked with improved learning, with a direct correlation to reading fluency and memory. It also helps with improvements in student concentration and cooperation.

Speaker 1: 12:38

In 2016, the Shape of the Nation report found that only two areas nationwide the state of Oregon and the District of Columbia mandated the nationally recommended levels of physical education in schools, which is 150 minutes per week for elementary school students and 225 minutes per week for high school students. At that time, only 37% of states demanded a set amount of time for physical education in elementary school. That percentage drops to 29% in middle and high schools. 62% of states permits schools to allow students to substitute other activities for physical education. There are people who think that marching band and ROTC are substitutes for physical education, but this is not necessarily the case, because just being active is not sufficient. There needs to be a strong educated component that includes teaching kids new things. Raising the money for the exercise equipment in the classroom can be an expensive undertaking. It can cost roughly $1,700 per classroom. A nonprofit organization called Stand Up Kids, founded by Juliette Starrett, a parent in California, is working to get every public school student nationwide a standing desk within 10 years.

Speaker 1: 14:21

In 2015, six health and civil rights groups filed a complaint with the US Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, alleging California was failing to comply with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by not providing equal access to physical education opportunities to minority students. There's always a watch group that looks at discrepancies and discrimination, even in the area of physical education in public schools. The complaint alleges that the state's education code, which requires elementary schools to provide students with at least 200 minutes of physical education every 10 days, while middle and high schools must provide 400 minutes over that same time span, does not apply to black and minority students who are systematically denied quality physical education and were less physically fit than other students in California public schools. The filing states that the evidence points to both unjustified discriminatory impacts and intentional discrimination in access to resources for education and fitness. California's education code requires the state superintendent to audit at least 10% of the districts each year to ensure that they're compliant with the PE requirements. The State Department of Education is also supposed to collect data on minutes of PE instruction from grades one through 12 and to post the summary online. The state was not compliant with either of those requirements per the 2015 filing, and the complainants were looking to the US Department of Justice to either terminate or suspend federal funding and financial aid to the state if these requirements were not met.

Speaker 1: 16:32

Disparities in access to physical education and fitness were an unfortunate symptom of the state's failure to follow physical education and civil rights standards. Physical education is key to a student's academic success and health. Hopefully, california has made important strides to ensure that they're compliant with all PE requirements, especially those pertaining to unjustified discriminatory impacts. Here are some action steps that you can take regarding this topic. If there is insufficient allotted time for physical education in your child's school, you can enroll your child in programs offered through your city's parks and recreation department or through organizations such as the YMCA. The costs are generally reasonable and most programs have a sliding scale based on your family's income and the number of children who will be enrolled in the program. This is a great way to supplement your child getting sufficient physical exercise, as well as building their social emotional skills through cooperation, self-management and discipline, as well as teamwork. Thank you, participation in physical education has been shown to have a beneficial effect on academic performance of African American high school girls, according to a study published in the Urban Education Journal in 2015.

Speaker 1: 18:16

Some legislators consider physical education as a core academic subject, putting it in the same category as English, science, math and History. Exercise has been linked with improved learning, with a direct correlation to reading fluency and memory. It also helps with improvements in student concentration and cooperation. Physical education is more rigorous than recess. Recess is typically about 20 minutes, which is insufficient for adequate physical exercise. Physical education is widely seen as an important subject for developing motor skills as well as knowledge about healthy living. The learning aims of physical education include developing a competence in training health, sportsmanship, cooperation with other students and applying effort to reach one's physical or sports goals. Organized sports may be an important component in ensuring sufficient physical activity, which is an important aspect of general health and well-being, especially for 8 to 12-year-old children.

Speaker 1: 19:45

If this is the type of subject matter and discussion that resonates with you, please follow my podcast or whatever service you're listening to this. Also, I'd love to hear from you, so please leave me a rating or review or a comment on Apple or PodChaser If you like this podcast. The best way to support me and help me grow it is by leaving a review. This helps my rankings and entices other people to listen to the show and share this episode with anyone that you think would find it valuable. Be sure to tell your friends, family and community about my podcast. You can always connect with me on Instagram and Facebook with the handle Kim J Fields, or reach out to me with a specific question by sending me an email to Kim at Liberation Through Education dot com. Thanks for listening today. I hope you'll come back for more K-12 educational discussions with even more exciting topics to untangle. Be sure to stay tuned. On the next episode, I'll be discussing the gender gap, why boys can't keep up. Until next time, aim to learn something new every day.