Uptown Skate School

Skateboarding goes to School

The following is an exerpt from Harvard Education Letter - "Getting a Jump on Good Health" , By Sara-Ellen Amster

The New PE

The NIH is not alone in its judgment that in order to improve children’s health we need to change the way PE classes are structured. Across the country, educators and researchers are experimenting with ways to make physical education more relevant to students’ lives, so that students learn that exercise can be an enjoyable and satisfying part of life.

The new PE makes fitness fun and leaves no one on the bench. In most cases, that means doing away with highly competitive team sports that leave many kids on the margins of gym class and those dreaded fitness tests (chinups, situps, laps on the track, etc.) that can publicly humiliate many students.

It means adding a greater variety of games and activities, especially those for small groups, so that all students will enjoy PE, not just athletes. The best programs, say researchers, emphasize cooperation and fair play while making sure everyone gets an equal chance to participate. Nontraditional sports such as skateboarding, handball, and dance may find a place in the curriculum, particularly if children request them.

"We need more sports where everyone can play," says Susan Wooley, executive director of the American School Health Association (ASHA). "For the athletically inclined, interscholastic sports are great, but the kid who is obese and uncoordinated is not going to get picked and will sit on the bench." In addition, research shows that team sports do not interest girls as much as individual and dual activities, according to the NIH’s Stone.

Schools that teach mainly team sports do not adequately prepare students for physical fitness as adults, says James Sallis, a San Diego State University psychologist who researches physical education. "High schools focus on football, basketball, soccer, and other team sports, but the percentage of adults who do those kinds of things is in the single digits. It’s better to teach jogging, tennis, and brisk walking. Why couldn’t a high school gym look more like a fitness center?" In addition, many schools have too little or inadequate sports equipment. Teaching 30 students to play basketball with three balls is like "trying to teach reading to a class of 30 with three books," says Sallis.

George Graham, a professor of physical education at Virginia Tech University, adds, "Kids are better off without some physical education programs. They turn kids off to physical activity and convince them they are no good [at exercise]. You go into a gym and see a few kids playing basketball and many sitting in the bleachers."

That rings a bell with Sean Gardner, 17, a recent graduate of Hamilton High School in Los Angeles, where PE was required daily through sophomore year. He says some of his classmates balked at PE. "A lot of kids were lazy or they weren’t that good at sports and sometimes that would slow down the kids who did want to participate. I’d say the best thing we could do for them is give [disinterested students] more attention and find the things they like to do."