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QUALITY
PHYSICAL EDUCATION: THE FOUNDATION OF
A COMPREHENSIVE SCHOOL PHYSICAL ACTIVITY
PROGRAM Written
by: Charles Morgan, Ph.D., University
of Hawaii
 Quality
physical education is the most important
component of a comprehensive school
physical activity program. The result
of a quality physical education experience
is that all students are provided with
the skills, knowledge, and attitudes
necessary to lead a physically active
lifestyle. The National Association
for Sport and Physical Education (NASPE)
has described attributes of a quality
physical education in a 2003 position
statement (NASPE, 2003). In addition,
the U. S. Department of Health and Human
Services’ (USDHHS) Healthy People
2010 Objective 22-10 has described quality
physical education as being active at
least 50% of class time (USDHHS, 2000).
Increasing physical
activity time to 50% in class is an
important goal because activity times
in class are consistently low. McKenzie
and colleagues have directly observed
physical activity levels during physical
education (PE) in over 1,000 schools
(McKenzie, 2006). They have found that
activity levels average 37% of lesson
time. Intervention schools in these
studies increased their activity time
to 50%, which reaches the Healthy People
2010 objective.
How much more
physical activity do children receive
comparing average activity times (37%)
to quality activity times (50%)? In
this example let us assume that an elementary
student receives daily physical education
over a 40 week school year for 30 minutes
per day. Quality (50%) and average (37%)
activity time would equal 15 and 11
minutes of activity respectively. So
quality PE provides an additional 4
minutes of activity per day. Projecting
an additional 4 minutes per day over
a year would provide: 20 minutes more
activity per week, 1 hour and 20 minutes
more activity per month, and 13 hours
and 20 minutes more activity per year.
If we considered this example over 7
years in elementary education (K-6)
- quality physical education could provide
93 more hours or 186 more 30 minute-lessons
compared to average PE.
It is no surprise
that many underestimate what an additional
4 minutes of activity per day could
provide over 13 hours of activity in
a school year. Those additional 13 hours
of activity could illicit meaningful
health and wellness benefits while concurrently
helping students reach benchmarks in
national, state, and local physical
education standards. It should be noted
that some students have very low activity
levels during and outside of school
so the additional hours of activity
time could have a greater effect on
their health/wellness and learning compared
to other students.
How can a teacher
increase activity time in class? The
remainder of this article will focus
on managerial strategies and planning
and organization that will help you
consistently increase activity levels
in class. Simply stated - decreasing
managerial and instructional time will
help increase activity time. To increase
activity time you must also plan and
organize for maximum activity.
Managerial
Strategies. One way to
decrease overall managerial time is
to focus on routines that can be measured
by response latency. Response latency
is defined as the amount of time that
it takes from the start of a command/signal
to the time the last student adheres.
The following list of routines will
illustrate this notion. It should be
noted that these strategies are very
connected to promoting a positive learning
environment and students self-managing
their behavior - so think of the potential
synergistic effects of these strategies.
- Start and Stop commands/signals
- often taken for granted in an inefficient
lesson these simple and often used
routines can take up to 30 seconds
for each command. Over the course
of a 30 minute lesson, this can add
up to a large percentage of class
time wasted on starting and stopping
the students.
Strategy:
Loud, assertive stop signal (i.e.,
traditional whistle); use a voice
as a start signal because your instructions
usually precede your start signal
(i.e., “go” “start”).
Goal:
3-5 seconds.
- Grouping
- there are many different strategies
for grouping students, some of which
can take over a minute. Consider the
ones that require minimal response
latency for everyday use. Limit the
social and learning grouping strategies
that can take up to several minutes
to complete.
Strategy:
have a clear signal to start grouping;
group with students closest to you;
partners group in toe-toe, elbow-elbow,
back-back; and groups of three or
more sit in line formation –
this will help the students and teacher
determine who has and has not grouped;
have a designated location for non
grouped students to immediately return
to.
Goal: 15-25
seconds.
- Handling
equipment - depending of the type
and quantity of equipment and the
facility in which you teach, distributing
and returning equipment can take over
a minute for each task. Again, the
goal is to use valuable time on activity
and practice opportunities as opposed
to management.
Strategy:
prearrange equipment in many different
designated locations; contain equipment
at the different locations (i.e.,
box, hoop, etc.) to prevent scattering;
if possible, schedule the same type
of classes during a block of time
to prevent many different types of
equipment set up per day; require
students gently place equipment on
the ground on your stop signal to
maximize instructional delivery (on-task
during instruction) and care for the
equipment.
Goal: 15-25
seconds.
- Entering
and exiting an activity area - depending
on your facility this can also account
for several minutes of managerial
time.
Strategy:
upon entry into the activity area
students should be active and ready
to learn; students do not exit the
activity area until instructed; try
to decrease dress-in and out time
by one minute where applicable.
Goal:
15-25 seconds.
- Transitions
- transitions between different types
of activities take a bulk of managerial
time and often disrupt the flow of
the lesson.
Strategy:
the response latencies for the above
routines must be short in duration
because generally a transition will
have several routines in unison.
Goal:30
seconds or fewer
Strategies
for all managerial routines: Have
clear expectations (rules) of how long
the response latency should be for each
task (i.e., 5 seconds for stop and starts)
and have clear consequences for not
meeting the expectation; model your
managerial routines and provide positive
specific feedback related to managerial
routines. Remember, you are simultaneously
decreasing managerial time, promoting
a positive learning environment (increasing
learning for all), and teaching students
to self-manage or be responsible for
their behavior.
Planning for Maximum Activity.
To maximize activity time you must plan
for management, instruction, and activity.
Many teachers plan for these specific
events but rarely quantify the amount
of time it will take for each event.
Planning for each managerial, instructional,
and activity event will help you immediately
determine weather you planned for 50%
activity. For example, if you are planning
a 30 minute lesson you could determine
how much time you have dedicated for
each of the events. Simply add a column
in your lesson plan to estimate how
much time you will spend for each management,
instruction, and activity task, and
sum the events to determine if you reached
15 minutes of activity. Planning for
appropriate amount of activity is the
first step to a quality lesson.
Increasing activity time in class is
a national health objective because
average activity times in physical education
are low. Children do not compensate
or make-up for activity outside of school;
therefore, it is important that physical
education makes a meaningful contribution
to the daily physical activity recommendation
for all children (Morgan, Beighle, &
Pangrazi, 2007). We have suggested several
managerial and planning strategies that
will help you maximize activity in class.
The additional activity time could illicit
health benefits and help students meet
national, state, and local benchmarks
for physical education standards.
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