Wednesday, April 4, 2012
What is Nutrition in Education: Physical Education
I have already spoken briefly about Physical Education when discussing the importance of recess as an element of Nutrition in Education. Mostly, I just spoke about the lack of vigorous activity children get during PE as a result of how the class is so frequently structured. This does not, by any means, indicate that children should not have PS classes as part of their curriculum.
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| by Old Shoe Woman |
Unfortunately, PE is one of those "elective"classes that when school budgets get cut, are sadly shown the door. Even when schools have PE classes, reductions in the time spent in PE have become common, as PE is not part of the standardized testing that schools are required to complete each year. Alarmingly more and more schools don't even have a gym for PE even if they still have a PE teacher. This is happening locally - in Clark County, Ky, they are currently building a new High School - a high school that will not have gym, as it is not in the budget. The adolescents of this school will have to ride a bus to the middle school in order to use the facilities. And most concerning - the school board does not see this as an alarming problem!
Rather that have you read about it, I actually found a fantastic video about the state of PE in our schools and its relationship to the obesity crisis. The video also features a number of PE teachers, physical education specialists and schools who are doing their part of make children more active inside and outside the PE classroom.
The good news is that there are people out there who understand the importance of physical activity and are leading the charge on change. Fitness Integrated with Teaching (FIT) Kids Act (H.R.1057/S.576) is a federal legislation has been re-introduced in the 112th Congress by
Representatives Ron Kind (D-WI) and Jim Gerlach (R-PA) in the House of
Representatives, and by Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) in the Senate. The
bill would establish a framework for schools to closely look at the
quality and quantity of PE they are providing, and to supply parents
with that information to better understand the PE their kids are
receiving.
Unfortunately, this Bill has been stuck in senate for over a year. If you would like to help get the bill moving again the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the American Heart Association both have some awesome suggestions and form letters that you can add your details to and send to your Senators, available here and here respectively.
At the beginning of this blog we also discussed House Bill 68, which is specific to Kentucky schools. This bill would require a 45 minutes per week
of physical activity for half day kindergarten and 90 minutes per week for full day kindergarten
through grade five. Like the FIT Kids Act, this bill is also stuck in committee. If you would like to know more about this bill and what you can do to help move it along, visit this blog post.
If you are not from Kentucky and would like to know more about your states policies of physical education, you can visit this site which lists all policies relating to PE in each state.
Resources
Labels: What is Nutrition Education
by E Pace at 8:19 AM |
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