Weren't they always required?

We had fitness tests all through elementary and Jr. High and PE was always required...that was more than 20 years ago.


/fark, I feel old saying that. :P

Good.

Fat lazy pieces of shiat.

eqtworld: Elementary school PE won't do shiat for this problem.

But with vigorous activities such as juggling, how are the kids still getting fat?

Well this is what you get for banning Tag.

GEEEEEE but can't the sweet little complainers get hurt at recess?

/tired of PC nancy states
// Your kid wants dirt

Sorry, I got stuck after reading the phrase "fudge factor"

being fat is not an epidemic. its being farking lazy

ChewbaccaJones: Weren't they always required?

We had fitness tests all through elementary and Jr. High and PE was always required...that was more than 20 years ago.


Yes, but every time they revisit these laws they feel it necessary to up the requirements on how many PE credits are required to graduate.

Of course, what they don't legislate is what's required of those PE classes. TFA says it was jacked up to 150 minutes a week. So that's 150 minutes of leaping infront of a dodgeball then sitting on the bleachers for the next 40 minutes of class, or standing in a corner watching others shoot a few hoops.

TheJoeY: Well this is what you get for banning Tag.

needs more Flickerball and Wallyball

But won't that hurt their self esteem??????????

ChewbaccaJones: Weren't they always required?

We had fitness tests all through elementary and Jr. High and PE was always required...that was more than 20 years ago.


/fark, I feel old saying that. :P

Nope.

Say what you want about Huckabee but he is the only one that gets it on this topic. "We don't have a health care crisis in this country, we have a health crisis." AMEM BROTHER!!.

Mandatory PE is a waste of everyone's time and hasn't fixed the problem. Scrap it and let kids cram in more real learning electives, like programming or electronics. Let the jocks use the PE facilities to actually practice for sports teams rather than after school. A win-win for everyone...

(Now cue the "If school hadn't forced me to play X, I never would have learned how much I like it because I'm a timid moron" crowd...)

If you would like to do more to help the precious little snowflakes, please help Richard Simmons help them

But cant the snowflakes get hurt if they do physical things????

LawrencePerson: Mandatory PE is a waste of everyone's time and hasn't fixed the problem. Scrap it and let kids cram in more real learning electives, like programming or electronics. Let the jocks use the PE facilities to actually practice for sports teams rather than after school. A win-win for everyone...

(Now cue the "If school hadn't forced me to play X, I never would have learned how much I like it because I'm a timid moron" crowd...)

I don't know. Back when there was PE, there was always that fat kid in class. Now there is always that skinny kid in class.

I'm a fat guy that took Badminton as one of his required PE classes, so I'm getting a kick out of these replies.

with lead singer Steven Carr?
/LINGER LONGER!

I'm all for them making sure to have PE in schools--especially for lower grades--as long as they don't do what I think they will do and cut academics.

Kids need PE. They need to feel as if being reasonably fit and healthy is accessible for them and not just other people. Or you could just let them sit there and turn into a helpless 300 pound diabetic lump.

eqtworld: Elementary school PE won't do shiat for this problem.

I agree. What these fat little urchins need is work.
Don't we still have coal mines?

Cheesus: I'm a fat guy that took Badminton as one of his required PE classes, so I'm getting a kick out of these replies.

hahaha!

One of mine was 'individual and dual sports' which was pickleball for the first half of the course (an actual workout) and pingpong for the second half.

ChewbaccaJones: Weren't they always required?

We had fitness tests all through elementary and Jr. High and PE was always required...that was more than 20 years ago.


/fark, I feel old saying that. :P

This. I always had PE all the way up to my senior year in High School. I think it should be required everywhere. BOMBARDMENT!

You know who else madated physical fitness programs in the schools.

Kaymon: Sorry, I got stuck after reading the phrase "fudge factor"

Same here. Tee hee.

Disgruntled Postal Worker: But won't that hurt their self esteem??????????

They'll be invited to participate in the community of fitness. Exclusion will require a signed doctor's prescription for either Zoloft or Strattera.

"mandated"

Mandatory PE promotes homosexuality because it forces viril young men to shower together while a middle-aged "coach" supervises watches them.

/ How'd I do? 2/10....

Heh. Every PE class I every had was run by some sports coach who didn't have the slightest idea of what to do with the unathletic or uncoordinated. They certainly didn't waste valuable chatting time actually instructing kids on how to play the sports they coached.

PE should be more specific. If the class is run by a basketball coach, call the class "basketball" and teach the doughy wads assigned to it some remedial basketball. How to hold a basketball. The correct stance for shooting it. How to dribble a ball without collapsing.
Hell, even if the teacher's a football coach, why not just have a whole semester devoted to flag football instead of the current mismatch of random activities most PE classes are devoted to.

Oh well. At least PE will teach kids how to deal with failure, a skill most kids today haven't learned...yet.

I'm doing the Couch to 5k plan now, finally, at age 35.

I wish there had been something like that when I was a kid. I tried so hard to run in track teams and that sort of thing, but it was too much. I have never been able to run a mile in my life. I was 'that fat kid.'

Give them reasonable, gradual goals to achieve, and they can do it.

I hated mandatory PE, but it benefited me. Swimming and track did, anyway. They always gave us those fitness tests, every quarter. We spent a couple of weeks getting ready for them, too.

Of course there were still a couple of fat kids, although looking back at my year book, I'm amazed at how this one girl who was the fattest girl in school for a decade, by today's standards, well, she could definitely run for Miss England.

We had no super-ginormous kids in our high school (1200 kids), but where I teach today we have to have those kingly desks or whatever they call them, and special chairs to accomodate people over 300 pounds.

There are quite a few. It's not unusual for them to be ambulatory when they start college, but to be on a motorized cart by grad school.

They should have special ed for obese kids.

They should make it so that every time there's a test, the bottom 10% get kicked out of school for ever.

/would have been kicked out in grade 4

I think the mandatory activity times for junior high and senior high schools is negligible. If a kid wasn't active and/or lazy in elementary school there's little that can be done for it.

The school districts around me when I was in school (the 90s) little by little kept subtracting time for recess and PE through the years in favor of more instruction time to teach to the TAKS (or then TAAS) test.
I even remember one particular teacher that only let her class have 2 or 3 days a week where she even let them outside for recess. Guess what class didn't get to go outside the one time it snowed and 10 kids built a snowman?

So first you take away play/exercise time because our kids are performing poorly on tests, then you realize all that emphasis on testing is making our children fat, sick, and lazy and try to combat that by making MORE state or federally mandated rules that they be physically active.

The way one (and my favorite) of the elementary schools did it was the best.

PE, Music, and Computer Lab time (remember, the early to mid 90s) were all traded off. Our Computer lab teacher wasn't always there. She rotated between like 3 or 4 different schools. PE was every other day either with Music or Comp days (when applicable) for 45-50 minutes. It was plenty of time to have a jump rope contest, play several games of dodgeball, break a tetherball, play scooter hockey, 4-square, learn bowling, whatever. And then we had recess after lunch for 20-30 mins and another for 10-20 mins.

I highly doubt there's many school around nowadays that gives that much play time to kids.

We may not have been the best school academically, but we did get our state recognition a couple of times. Good test results + a lot of play time = happy, smart and healthy kids!

One of the biggest causes of obesity in this country at the high school level especially is that no one outside of the "jock" clique feels the need to get any exercise.

Just because you're Totally Goth doesn't mean your heart doesn't need regular workouts as well, Daemion. Just because you fit into skinny girl jeans doesn't mean you're healthy, Emo Boy.

Just because stupid people play sports doesn't mean it's stupid to play sports.

Back in my elementary school we ran, every single day. If it was raining we ran indoors. After running we played dodgeball, basketball, kickball etc.

Good. I think we have become so protective of our collective society a*ses by eliminating things like this to avoid lawsuits that we fail to see how that is actually making more problems.

Sure I was obese growing up but I participated as much as I could handle physically. I was laughed at and made fun of (which made things worse) but at least I got some exercise.

Funny thing is, now that I have lost almost 1/2 my bodyweight I enjoy some of the things that PE teachers used to torture me with.

/I weighed more than Jared from Subway
//no, really - www.iweighedmorethanjared.com
///went from a 5k calorie eater to a 5k runner
////well, now 8k runner (10k is not far away!)

Let's just recall and destroy the current batch, then start over.

People are getting fatter, no if ands or buts, due to poor eating habits, total lack of responsibility in adults and for their children.

And these are the same parents who post here "well my bmi is this and it has me as obese"

The reality if you are carrying around 20 extra lbs, that is quite a bit of weight. And you set bad examples for your children.

My girlfriend and I are perfect examples of two generations.

I am 39, 5'5 140 lbs. No Skinny, not fat. I like to eat but I was raised with salads and fruits as snacks, I do not eat sweets. And I and I am from Louisiana, a fattening place.


Girl is 28, 5.0 145 lbs right now. Was 120 when we met. Was alyssa milano curvy hot. She put on 25 lbs, and still is good looking, but now approaching the cute fat chick territory.

Her eating habits. Anything with creamy salad dressing, chips, etc, just like her fat ass mom eats.

The kicker is she thinks she is still tiny because she wears petites, size 14.

I love my girl, and I am sure she will get the weight off. But I can tell you this.

I work in the life insurance field, and they do not use BMI for the most part. They all have adjusted their height weight charts. I just referenced the top 15 companies height weight charts, and at my height I can get as high as 210-230 lbs and still get standard rates.

At my height 200 lbs I would be HUGE.

Arnold S. was 61 235 when he was mr olympia. We all ain't arnold. There are some big muscular people out there, but it is not the majority.

People need to suck it up, and put the doritos down.

Does anybody really believe that mandating PE has any effect on overweight kids? How does playing dodgeball for 45 minutes twice a week counteract the 9 hours of sitting on the couch watching TV and eating greasy snacks once they're home?

The fat kids don't get any exercise in PE class anyway, because they're always the first one to get hit with the dodgeball, and then they just spend the rest of the game sitting/standing on the sidelines. They probably get more exercise walking to their next class than in an entire Gym period.

If they are adding a requirement to the school curriculum it would seem that either:

(a)The school day must be made longer-unlikely because of associated costs in keeping the school open longer or

(b)Other courses of instruction must be cut which costs less in terms of dollars.

Now given the nature of our public school system and the politically correct attitude that pervades the thought process of most "professional" educators which is more likely to be cut to make room for PE? Math and computer science or Heather has two mommies and cultural diversity instruction?

If parents shoved their kids outside to play once in a while instead of letting their faces be glued to the tv and video games I doubt they'd need as much in-school play time. When my siblings and I were kids we got off the bus, threw our backpacks by the front door and took off playing and continued to run around and play outside till suppertime. After supper we did homework if we had any, and THEN we could watch tv before bed. Cartoons were only for saturday mornings. And because we'd worked ourselves out playing we were tired by 8 or 9 and went to bed at a decent time with a full nights sleep.

/wait..asking parents to be responsible for their kids health?
//whatever was I thinking...

Lamune_Baba: ChewbaccaJones: Weren't they always required?

We had fitness tests all through elementary and Jr. High and PE was always required...that was more than 20 years ago.


Yes, but every time they revisit these laws they feel it necessary to up the requirements on how many PE credits are required to graduate.

Of course, what they don't legislate is what's required of those PE classes. TFA says it was jacked up to 150 minutes a week. So that's 150 minutes of leaping infront of a dodgeball then sitting on the bleachers for the next 40 minutes of class, or standing in a corner watching others shoot a few hoops.

Jacked up to 150 minutes a week?!?!? When I was in school PE twice that. 150 minutes a week is just 30 minutes a day..... Hell, given how long it takes to organize kids that's probably less than 10 minutes a day. No wonder kids are fat!

HAHAHAHA!

Pardon me, but I just had to, because when I went to school, PE was required all the way into college. You could only get out of it when you reached 25.

One president made a big thing about encouraging physical fitness -- Kennedy, I think -- and we had T-shirts with slogans on them and you could enter contests to win awards and so on.

I have to say that my generation of kids were in top shape. Not just because of PE, but because the majority of us rode bikes to and from school, ran and played our arses off outside and it was rare to find an obese kid. Usually when you did, he or she had some reason for it besides stuffing their mouths with burgers and fries.

With the Vietnam war on and the draft awaiting right after graduation, colleges required physical education. By age 25, you were considered basically no longer draftable. You could relax and work on that beer gut.

Isn't hindsight wonderful?

I wonder how long it will be before they realize that suing the krap out of schools and teachers every time they fart does not encourage good education?

MisanthropicSway: If parents shoved their kids outside to play once in a while instead of letting their faces be glued to the tv and video games I doubt they'd need as much in-school play time. When my siblings and I were kids we got off the bus, threw our backpacks by the front door and took off playing and continued to run around and play outside till suppertime. After supper we did homework if we had any, and THEN we could watch tv before bed. Cartoons were only for saturday mornings. And because we'd worked ourselves out playing we were tired by 8 or 9 and went to bed at a decent time with a full nights sleep.

/wait..asking parents to be responsible for their kids health?
//whatever was I thinking...


Hell I was raised by my grandparents (well, really just my grandmother, she wouldn't let grandpa have a say) and they wouldn't let me outside hardly at all. I'd get sick, I'd get hurt, I'd interact with the goddamn Mexicans or Jehovah's Witnesses (serious excuse). I never got to play in the snow until high school. Now she thinks I'm anorexic (seriously) because I only weigh 250 when I used to weigh over 320. Yet the doctor won't certify her as "bat shiat crazy".

MisanthropicSway: If parents shoved their kids outside to play once in a while instead of letting their faces be glued to the tv and video games I doubt they'd need as much in-school play time. When my siblings and I were kids we got off the bus, threw our backpacks by the front door and took off playing and continued to run around and play outside till suppertime. After supper we did homework if we had any, and THEN we could watch tv before bed. Cartoons were only for saturday mornings. And because we'd worked ourselves out playing we were tired by 8 or 9 and went to bed at a decent time with a full nights sleep.

/wait..asking parents to be responsible for their kids health?
//whatever was I thinking...

Silly that what the village/government is for. Besides by allowing letting you create your own fun outside unsupervised instead of some govnment approved activity your parents were engagin in child neglect if not abuse.

Before the chubby chasers chime in, i have a question...

Have you ever seen a fat kid play dodgeball?

I mean a human being get hit by a red rubber ball at 40+ mph.

Just wondering.

At 39 5'5 140 I am good shape. I don't lift as much as I should, had about 15 lbs of muscle that I lost. Will probably get it back. Can't get the hair back. I have a sit down job, but still hit the treadmill in the living room. I put it in front of the tv for inspiration.

The emphasis on testing is NOT making children fat and lazy. The schools have almost nothing to do with children performing poorly, behaving badly, or getting tubby. The responsibility lies predominantly with the family. They are at school typically 6 hours a day, 5 days a week, 10 months out of the year. That's 1200 hours a year. You have them the other 7560. Quit feeding children a bunch of corn-based sugar-filled carbs and shoving them in front of the television to keep them from bothering you. Don't drive them the half mile to the bus stop,(you know who you are!), walk with them. Stop worrying that the sun will melt their skin, the bad men will steal them and rape them, and the nipple they glimpsed on TV will turn them into depraved sex addicts. You are killing your children. Feed them healthy foods, get off your fat ass and cook meals, throw them outside to collect bugs, fall out of trees, and get dirty. Monitor their homework. Teach them things. Go learn some things yourself. Be a parent or get your damn tubes tied.

/pet peeve.

I live in the only state that requires a full slate of P.E.

And it also happens to be one of the fattest states.

So lets not spend any more money on some useless program that may or may not work, mmkay?

Just beat the kids until they are no longer fat.

Florida elementary schools already have PE classes. And we have daily recess. This just extends the time involved and forces classroom teachers to do the extra work (no money in the bill to hire the necessary extra PE teachers.) Of course it takes away from teaching actual curriculum, which is about an hour and a half a week from the 22 curriculum-teaching hours available (don't forget about other specials, lunch, recess, and just corralling 20 children to go anywhere.) As a teacher, it shouldn't be my problem that parents don't make their kids go outside and play instead of sitting in front of the TV eating junk food. I can't wait to see what Charlie cooks up next.

I'm not fat, you are....

Suck it!