All that’s needed is a governor’s signature and Virginia will have yet another unfunded mandate. Starting in 2014, all elementary and middle schools must provide 150 minutes of PE per week for students. Half-day kindergarten students would be exempt. This change would be most significant in elementary schools where only 10% of schools meet the state standard. Recess would not be allowed to substitute for PE.
Not everyone likes the new law. The VEA opposes the bill. Several school systems oppose it also. According to the Washington Post:
But some school district officials oppose the looming requirement – to be implemented in 2014 – saying it could extend the school day, lead to cuts in arts and music classes, or increase costs because additional teachers would be needed.
“Schools can’t be expected to solve all of society’s problems,” said Fairfax Superintendent Jack D. Dale, who lobbied against the legislation.
Naturally, educators are concerned about PE cutting in to instructional time for academics. One of the biggest problems is where to hold PE classes during inclement weather. Many elementary schools simply lack facilities to have phyical activities going on inside the building. Most schools do not have gyms and often use the cafeteria when lunch isn’t being served. That’s going to be a problem.
Let’s say that there are 3 classes of each grade level. That number is fairly standard. 3 classes times 6 grade levels is 18 class periods who have use a multipurpose room when lunch isnt served…each for 150 minutes a week. Breaking it down into a day, that’s 30 minutes a day if done daily. If kids are in school 7 hours a day and let’s say 3 hours are taken up with serving lunch, taking tables up and down, and cleaning up that leaves 4 hours for PE instruction. Only 8 classes can do a 30 minute session. That’s less than half of classes. Perhaps they can double or triple up.
Who is going to teach PE? In elementary school, the teacher of everything else will inherit that duty. In middle school, anyone with a middle school endorsement can do it but, again, where? This is Virginia. Winter time doesn’t encourage outdoor activity from December through March. Its just too darn cold. There is often snow on the ground.
Currently, different schools have different requirements, according to the WaPo:
In Fairfax County, the state’s largest school district, students at 139 elementary schools are required to take at least 60 minutes of physical education a week. Prince William County requires 90 minutes a week for students at 55 elementary schools.
and
Keith Imon, Prince William’s assistant superintendent for communication and technology services, said that children do need to get more physical activity but that he doesn’t know how the bill can be implemented without additional costs. The county would have to increase physical education for elementary school students as well as sixth- and seventh-graders, who take about 112 minutes of physical education a week.
8th graders have the health component worked into the PE program. That’s less time for them also.
Once again, the General Assembly has failed to think something through. All kids need more physical activity, no one is arguing that one. However, the new law is simply not do-able. So once again schools and school systems will be figuring out ways to get around the new law because they have no choice. Not enough teachers, not enough space and not enough time. Things are already stretched to the max. Remedial classes are held in stairwells and broom and book closets in many schools.
The State Board of Education has thumbed its nose at recess for the past 30 or so years in favor of PE. As I recall, recess used to be the time that kids ran outside and jumped rope, played ball, and generally let off a lot of steam from being cooped up in class most of the day. Maybe the state legislature ought to consider bringing recess back. That’s when kids got outside and moved around. Kids do better at being kids than adults do when forced to provide structured PE. If we let kids be kids, there might be fewer health problems.
This is definitely a case where the state needs to be aware of unintended consequences. This plan is half-baked!
This is completely, irretrievably, utterly, idiotic. This is yet another example of politicians trying to show that they are “doing something” and putting it on the backs of the schools. After seeing what passes for history teaching in 4th and 4th grade, and having to have science alternate with history every month, I’m all for adding an hour to the day. We are already unable to teach kids in depth. The teachers spend all their time on the idiotic SOLs, jumping from subject to subject like a kangaroo on meth. They expect the kids to write sentences, paragraphs, etc, but don’t teach them script. The history curriculum was diluted to Henrico county for an ENTIRE semester. Now, they are learning all the states and state capitols. I did this in SECOND GRADE. They don’t have time NOW to teach the subjects needed.
150 minutes of PE? With class now lasting only 30 minutes, twice a week, this would mean that there would be PE every day. So, Mr. Politician, tell me what needs to be cut so that this can be implemented. If this is in response to all of the complaints about “fat kids,” its the freaking PARENTS that need to get their kids into shape, throw out the electronic games, buy some jump ropes and footballs, and go outside.
Couldn’t agree more. Add 30 minutes of reading comprehension. Learned the states/capitols from my parents at supper.
We can’t control what parents do. I would not mind mandatory recess where kids got out and ran and played, when it wasn’t snowing or raining and if it was above 40 degrees. (I remember not caring how cold it was.) They might be better behaved.
I don’t care when kids learn the states and capitals. Last I heard it was 5th grade. That doesn’t matter.
Cargo, do you mean script = cursive? When did that stop? I guess it isn’t needed any more. I can’t think of why it would be needed. Everyone keyboards with their thumbs, like monkeys. Is keyboard even being taught?
Sounds like a half-baked idea to me as well. Recess served as PE when I was a kiddo – we jumped rope, played hopscotch,ran, etc. By junior high (7th.& 8th. grades for us) we had a regular gym with dressing rooms and did more – danced, played basketball, softball, met some atheletic requirements mandated by the Kennedy Admin. (?), etc. We had to take only one year of physical/health education in high school.
I don’t know how schools are supposed to find the extra time much less the space to meet this new plan. It sounds like something proposed by parents whose spouses handled all the school affairs and they never stepped foot inside the school unless it was an event which offered a campaign opportunity.
@Censored
School systems and state boards of education always think they can create time. I guess the legislators have now caught the create time bug.
Love those unfunded mandates. How about mandating critical-language studies so that our kids can compete globally? How about starting that in kindergarten so that they have half a chance of actually becoming fluent, rather than waiting until middle school? How about more math and reading time? And whatever happened to term papers? Even the AP and honors classes aren’t as demanding anymore, judging from the amount of free time my kids seem to have after school. And research is done with mouse clicks in ways that involve very little critical thinking or creativity. I’m more concerned with kids who come to school with an empty stomach rather than kids whose parents let them eat too much junk food.
I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss knowing state capitols. It ‘s like dismissing Roman Numerals. It takes some discipline to know these things. Discipline is completely disappearing as a vital skill.
I worked with a woman once who asked me if I knew if North Carolina was north of us or west? I don’t think it’s the point, but the discipline involved in the learning and the imporatance of not looking like a total idiot in the office it should matter. Frankly, when teams were assembled she was not on my list. I thought then and still do that she was lazy.
Is this no suprise Richmond did it? Michelle Obama got into the lunch rooms, and eating & physical activity are interconnected in the “fight against obesity”. Although, I do credit the Feds for at least boosting funding for the USDA Lunch Programs..the salad bar though to me is kinda dumb as I remember the long road to get my own kids to eat salad with dinner when served.
O’Bannon is a neurologist…..
The facts are, children are getting bigger and bigger,” said Del. John M. O’Bannon III (R-Henrico), who introduced the bill in the House. “There are tremendous downstream consequences of that. I think this is a fair trade-off.”
@Juturna, these jokers in Richmond have to put money in with these mandates…to build gymnasiums etc. They think they can will it, and time and space are created. The disconnect it tremendous. Actually, I would say that part of the inactivity in schools has come from having to teach so damn many SOLs. SOLs and video games.
Of course the first Atari games came out in the late 70s. Those kids are at least 40 now aren’t they?
While we are on this subject of bigger kids….we would be remiss if we didn’t mention that many parents are uncomfortable allowing their kids to go out and play because of perverts. I would never let my kids go off on their bikes all day if they were kids today. It just isn’t safe.
I think knowing states, location, and state capitals is very important. I am just not willing to say that the entire ed system is failing if we don’t know them by 2nd grade. I would also like to add the importance of knowing the Canadian provinces and the countries of Central and South America. They are in our own hemisphere.
The states and the capitals used to be 5th grade. My kids both had to make elaborate floats to celebrate their state. It was a BIG deal. I think Nifty Fifty is probably more meaningful if the kid is a little past 2nd grade and the knowledge can be more in depth.
I can remember going on extended trips with parents and writing down all the different states I saw on license plates. That’s back in the day when just wealthy people flew places.
The States and Capitols are still being taught n 5th grade. In Louisiana, it was taught during the 2nd or 3rd grade. And the schools are not teaching cursive, yet they have not lessened the amount of writing. Cursive builds hand/eye coordination for fine motor control in writing. I’m going to try and teach it to my daughter over the summer.
Kids don’t have that kind of hand – eye coordination any more I don’t think. I was just talking to Elena about this very subject. Kids can barely use scissors. Girls do much better than boys, still. Not sure why cursive isn’t still taught. I called it script too when I was little. Just making sure we were on the same sheet of music. Its faster than printing, that’s for sure.
I can actually cut paper dolls (you know where you end up with 4 of them holding hands) of Pippi Longstocking, Pocahontas, Cinderella, etc. I can just fold the paper and do it. No pencils, lines or anything. My mother was even better than I am at it. She could do horses with bendable heads etc. I lived around a lot of adults during those days when I was an only child. The adults taught be to do things to entertain myself. Kids have a very difficult time doing things like I just described because no one teaches them to work with scissors. And remember, coloring got to be bad for kids too. All the child pschologists told us that the children were to create their own pictures and not just color a preprinted form. Bull. Learning to stay in the lines is a skill!
So is playing jack rocks. Does anyone remember jacks? I learned skip counting playing jacks.
How about a creative compromise? Incorporate some academics into PE. For example, there are many physical games that can be played that also teach math. The educational term for this approach is “total body response”.
That would probably make about the 8th lesson plan in a day for the teachers. It also doesn’t solve the space problem.
How about letting kids be kids and have recess? It might also improve social skills.
It’s the discipline involved that’s being lost. That won’t be made up by extending PE. Anyway, other than recess, why should schools be required to give PE? I’d like to understand the correlation between PE and academics.
We never flew as a family – yikes seven of us on a plane!! Although my parents might have liked to put us on a plane then pick us up at the Airport a day or two later….
My kids had to learn state capitols, regions in North America, countries and their capitols, etc.
A new geography class was implemented into the 4th or 5th grade curricula either last year or the year before. My daughter did a “state” float. (My daughter’s group had Alaska–you can imagine the jokes that came out of that one.)
@Raymond Beverage
I’m glad SOMEONE got into the lunch room besides Ronald McDonald! The fried, carb-laden food they charge for is still pretty bad.
Yeah, I can think of age appropriate memorization drills – multiplication tables, periodic tables, history dates and so on that might work with PE drills…. but 150 minutes is a LOT of time! Where’s marim? Reason #79 to buy that used van. 🙂
Recess breeds bullying – don’t you know that Moon??
@Moon-howler
No, they can just alter a couple of lesson plans without adding lesson plans. And since the state is mandating, the state can come up with some canned plans so the teachers can get a break once in awhile!
Jut, there are lots of fun things especially for elementary school kids, things that help with math which we are always complaining our kids don’t know. Want kids to learn multiplication tables? How about multiplication hopscotch? How about chant-the-tables jump rope? We teach kids to sing material and it works. Teach them the motion and the chants and the info will really stick.
Teachers can have schedule gym time, have the activities outside or use other spaces in the school. It’s not impossible. Besides, the teachers might like it. I would.
When we teach adults, we always try to get them to do something active in the classroom. Learners need to move around to help them keep focused.
Moon – you find the absolute BEST topics to put up here. I really enjoy it. Very eclectic.
Yes, I remember jacks, marbles too. Developed good pool skills playing marbles. Moon, we were outside all the time. Learned a lot from just being outdoors. How many kids can identify a tree by their leaves – I mean actually walk up to a tree and identify??
Pinko – I think you are saying incorporate a little PE into already scheduled class time. For the younger ones, that is good. On the other hand, any PE drill that could have helped me figure out a slide rule could probably be marketed.
The arts are always the first things cut. I am paying for my kids to get private art instruction now. Talk about discipline–they didn’t even know there was technique involved in art or that anyone could get “homework” in it. They know now, but I have to pay for it! Art is becoming a lost art.
There always were perverts. They just killed them then so you only had to worry about new ones growing. Here’s one Dem that has not problem with that. I place children preety high on the list.
You are right, Juturna, about just killing them. Many years ago there was a peeping Tom in Manassas, older section. he liked to peep in windows at women and he would cough. The men all jumped him, beat the living b-Jesus out of him and he went elsewhere.
I think there are either more perverts now or else they are more embolden. Maybe we just hear more about them but it makes you not want to let kids out.
@Raymond Beverage A salad bar in a school might as well just be one big petri dish where kids can go to build their immunity. Yuck.
@Juturna
I would LOVE to take on a task like that! Would be fun to be creative.
Older kids have to memorize things like grammar rules, periodic tables, square roots, etc. PE would really help in these cases.
You know, in adult ed, we have a list of physical games that the classes do. The PE part could easily be boosted.
Teachers are already at critical mass, Pinko. I guess that sort of thing would be fun if you weren’t responsible for a hundred other things in a day. Now it is just one more job and not enough time to do it in.
Time and space are already in real short supply.
What teach me a slide rule? 😉
Kids should bring a lunch.
@Juturna
Er, if I could figure out how to use one myself, I would! 🙂
I try to get my kids to bring lunch or buy salads. It’s always a PIA no matter what.
I see providing lunch as an unecessary expense/burden for schools. I know I’ll be chastised for the kids who’s parents wont. But why should they when it’s provided?
The lunch provided provide two ‘valuable’ government solutions.
1. Provide as many calories as possible to plump up kids (back when kids were too scrawny) to get our future warfighters to a combat weight [now they want the calories trimmed]
2. To provide kids from families where a meal might not be in the cards atleast one (or two) hot meals. In DC they’re even looking at three meals (dinner).
I remember in 1-6 grade getting 45 minutes of PE and also recess. :shrug: I’m not THAT old..
We had one at a swim meet in Manassess – he was offering ‘legs’ to the backstroke 9/10 – 11/12 girls. Just creepy. Fortunately one of the parents was/is a Judge and recognized it.
In theory, I agree with you. In practice, I don’t.
I think it’s time to take our kids back from the schools. All this is being done to address bad parenting. It’ll never end. Teachers are not supposed to raise kids then be graded on how well they do and subsequently paid based on that. No engineer or highly paid lawyer, Dr or other professional would accept unwilling clients then agree to be compensated based on the outcome.
I agree that teachers are supposed to be everything to kids, and that’s not fair. There the issue of where you draw the line, though. For example, do you flunk a kid because his parents can’t read and can’t support the kids’ education, therefore the kids can’t achieve? Do you not offer remediation? How do we as a society deal with these issues? We want the kids to become healthy parts of society, right?
Not at the expense of other kids and frankly that is what is happening. So our whole society will continue to decline. Why private schools are popping up. It’s hard to say that. But it’s realistic.
Lots of immigrant kids clawed their way out of places like Hell’s Kitchen in NYC without too much help. I know I sound cold, but we’re all sinking because of lousey parenting and this is the most overdone political correct area in the USA.
What’s happening is that the superachievers are making it through just fine. The most attention is going to the ones failing and the superachievers. The kids in the middle are lost.
So do locker rooms.
@Posting as Pinko
Pinko, there are very few elementary schools with gyms. Teachers do not need one additional thing to do. And YES, it would require a lesson plan.
Why don’t YOU volunteer to do that for your kids school. I feel certain those teachers don’t have time. In a perfect world, that is a great idea and nothing good teachers don’t do in classrooms daily. Not sure it would count as PE.
Again, time and space.
Its the practice that is going to be so difficult. You are welcome to think kinesthetic learning is a great idea. I think it is a good idea also. However, I think you just want to argue with me. Go into any elementary school in pwc. Find the gym. Find where 18 classes can have a PE class. December through March are very often too cold, too rainy, etc to go outside. The playgrounds are muddy or frozen over. A nice day comes along every once in a while but 150 minutes a week breaks down into 30 minutes per day.
And that doesn’t even touch on middle school. I have no idea how that is going to shake down.
The law is impractical. Pinko, I am talking about freaking reality, not how things might be if things were just a little different. You and the legislators obviously don’t understand how limited most public schools are as far as implementation.
That was the point of the post–not to discuss the merits of kenesthetic learning and slimming kids down. Everyone agrees it would be great.
Our elementary schools had gyms because they used to be high schools. It wasn’t unheard of to have a fifty year old (or older) school building. There were no little people sized toilets or water fountains. We were stuck with what we had. We also had an excellent cafeteria in one school. Children who were poor were given the opportunity to have a second helping of some foods. And we had no junk food available at the city schools – just a machine where we could buy milk or orange juice. The county schools were different. They had a candy shop right there on the playground.
I don’t remember phys. ed. being offered until some fitness mandate was dreamed up by the Kennedy Administration when I was in junior high. Then we had to meet all sorts of standards with no prior training. Talk about sore guts and aching feet as we had to do pushups, sit ups, and timed races to meet some goal. We hated it and hated phys. ed. after that.
I think kids spent much more time outside then (the olden days). My mother shooed us out of the house. We only came in to do our homework, to eat, and to watch about an hour of tv. I can’t remember any sedentary children. Now parents would probably have to make a special effort to get their kids out of the house and moving. It just seems one more burden being foisted off on the schools. Why not offer up a list of activities that children could do and have them do some of them at home.
@Moon-howler
Sheesh, MH, I’m not just trying argue. What I am saying is that, mandate or no, there are ways to get more physical activities into the classroom. Just making suggestions here. Don’t shoot me.
BTW, 8th graders have PE every day. I believe HS students do as well.
@Censored bybvbl
PE homework. Excellent idea. Once in awhile kids have that, but not often.
I hate the way PE is so centered around sports. This way, the basketball, football and soccer stars get to show off, and the couch-potato kids get next to nothing out of it. It’s stupid. Give the kids basic exercise, aerobics, dance, whatever, so that they can all get engaged and not get trampled by the superstars.
Did anyone ever have to do square dancing in PE? I did. Horrors!
@Emma, yes to the square dancing question. But that was a million years ago.
You are right about the PE programs being centered around sports.
Yes to square dancing and ballroom dancing with the cha cha and current popular dances as well – think a cleaned up version of Hairspray.
Emma, did square dancing and also tap dancing. That was 8th grade – the PE teacher was looking for alternate methods that also required physical activity. Never got really great at either style…LOL…but tap dancing did stay with me.
When I used to pull Staff Duty NCO in the Army, and the wee hours of the morning came on while sitting in a locked building, would get up and tap dance just to help stay awake 🙂
I work in an elementary school that was built not that long ago. The gym space is used all day every day. 55-60 kids (every 45 minutes) are jammed into a space that was originally meant for 25-30 kids. An assistant is hired to help the PE teacher, because it is less expensive than hiring an additional PE teacher. This is the way it is done in most schools. This also means that the 55-60 kids cannot be separated, because assistants are not allowed to supervise students by themselves.
The cafeteria portion of the “cafetorium” is not available, because it is either being prepared for lunch, used for lunch, or cleaned up after lunch. It is also used for assemblies and grade level events.
This year, we do have a “story room,” but it is used for strings classes a portion of every day, and has leveled steps. It cannot accommodate all the students who would need to use it.
Some years, our student population has been so large that we have had to use the story room as a classroom, as well as the teachers’ lounge. No PWC school can use trailers until they have used all the available space as classrooms (which means specialists “on a cart” traveling around the building.
The increase in PE time has already changed what the PE teachers can do with the kids during specials. That many children running around in one space leads to all sorts of problems (increased injury, etc.).
I can tell you that specialists are dreading how this will affect our role in schools. There has been talk of art, music, library, computer lab, and counseling instructors instructing PE as a way to fit this mandate. Great! It is excellent that we use our specialized training in this way, right?? Good lord! I know that music and counseling try to incorporate some movement into our subjects in interesting ways, but by no means do I think that this should be our new focus.
I believe that movement is connected to learning. Teachers have already been trained to incorporate “changes of state,” “brain learning,” and various other movement-based educational philosophies into their practice. I know a lot of teachers who do this. However, there is no way that they could do this enough to make the new requirement. Nor do I think that the state would accept that.
I don’t know how this will eventually manifest in schools, but it doesn’t seem practical.
I was unaware that 8th graders no longer take the health component during PE. That’s news to me. Maybe I misread what Pinko was talking about.
I think some middle schools only have 8th grade PE for 90 minutes every other day. Different schools have different schedules. The difference USED to be that because 8th grade has health classes, it didn’t go every other day with another non-academic like music, art, tech ed or teen living (home ec) 6th and 7th grade PE shares a time slot with those classes listed above (as well as any other subject a school might want to incorporate like keyboarading or sample foreign language) 8th grade PE doesn’t share the time slot with anything but PE.
I am completely mixed on this.
We have let the parents have the lead and they have proven –
they will let johnny get too fat
they will let johnny get lazy
they will not ask johnny to do anything physical
they will get johnny a happy meal any time he wants it
they will let johnny watch tv all day, including on the way to McD’s
they will let johnny play video games all day
they will let johnny stay in the heated/air conditioned house all the time
they will let johnny have a coke attached to his mouth at all times
Yes, the parents have failed – johnny is going to go through life predisposed to heart disease, diabetes, and obesity (hint, increased health care costs) – and the government should not have to tell the parents this, but the parents are not doing anything about preventing this.
Educating johnny about his own body and health is more important that knowing the state capitals or cursive – although, we should be able to do it all. Have we actually slowed (watered down) the curriculum’s in order to get everyone to a passing grade? They still teach cursive in PWC (3rd Grade), but do not require it to be used in the higher grades. In this world of computers and typing, I am not sure if it is so important now.
31% of Virginia youth are obese or overweight.
I don’t have a problem in the world with daily PE if (and only if) there were a place to do it and time to do it. We cannot create time. And most schools in PWC (and the rest of the state) don’t have indoor facilities for PE during winter or inclement weather.
I have a huge problem with once again giving schools an unfunded mandate where the goal is simply impossible to achieve. Maybe they should have started with less time and additional PE teachers–at least something that was achievable.
Your point is exactly what Moonhowler has been saying. It is critical to have kids excercising, but where and how do you do it? This is another unfunded mandate to an already stressed education system that is constantly on the chopping block for funds.@DiversityGal
I also might add, kids are getting fat because we parents allow vidoe games and television to interfere with good old fashioned outdoor fun.
Emma,
I vividly recall square dancing, the big thing was, what boy would ask you to dance!!!
Here are some safe, educational exercises to do in the classroom:
Rapid Handraising Writing Rules
Super Speedy Spelling Stretches
Marching Math Facts
Touch Your Toes Testing Skills
Heal to Hand Health Facts
Deep Knee Bend Division
Standing Stomach Crunching Sentence Structure
And the teachers’ favorite, only to be done in Richmond, Piss on Politics.