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September 1, 2004
PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND HEALTH
How to get kids moving: improving school phys-ed
CBC News Online
Some Canadians may be haunted by memories of being whipped by dodge balls in elementary school, or not being fit enough to play midfield in soccer. Unpleasant memories of phys-ed class can turn Canadians of all ages off exercise and sport, but there is a way to reverse the trend toward inactivity.
The combination of a car-friendly culture and sedentary activities like watching TV or playing video games makes it no wonder two-thirds of children and youth in Canada aren't physically active enough to gain health benefits.
The two-thirds statistic comes from a research paper published in 2002 in Nova Scotia. Scientists there fitted children with pedometers that recorded all of their physical activity – club and recreational sports, walking etc.
Over the past two decades, rates of overweight and obesity nearly tripled among Canadian children, according to the Canadian Institutes of Health Information's report, titled "Improving the Health of Canadians 2004."
Likewise, the report's authors noted four out of five Canadian youth are not active enough to meet international guidelines for optimal growth and development.
The figures mean Canada can only draw on about one-third of youth to fill the pool of potential Olympic athletes of the future.
In response to calls for more funding for athletes, the federal government added $30 million for amateur sport in 2004, raising the support to a total of $120 million.
Stephen Owen, Canada's minister of state for sport, suggested spreading the funding around. "You also have to have programs in schools and P.E. ‚ and facilitates that can help the broad range of Canadians participate," Owen said on Aug. 30, after the close of the Athens Games.
So how should the funding be targeted?
For Joe MacDonald, a professor at the school of education at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, N.S., funding for school sports teams should be connected to the school curriculum.
If young children are taught to understand how their bodies move, they'll be more likely to join the teams, he told CBC News Online. Instead of being intimidated, they'll learn to enjoy sports and physical activities.
Endocrinologist Dr. Laurent Legault of Montreal Children's Hospital agrees self-consciousness and low self-esteem can be barriers to phys-ed instruction. "We want to move past the team sports concept and move to activities that someone can take with them when they're 80," Legault said in March 2004. Teaching outdoor activities like cross-country skiing, for example, can be a hit with students.
Before they can get to that stage, though, children need some tools. MacDonald called today's children "physically illiterate" – just as they need to learn the mechanics of grammar to read and write, they also need to learn the "language of movement."
Students in primary grades need a foundation of quality phys-ed classes taught by phys-ed specialists, just as teachers specialize in teaching math or science, he said.
Lesson plans should teach gross and fine motor skills, spatial awareness and timing. It may seem like children can run instinctively, but according to MacDonald, they need to learn the pacing of running.
Teaching children how to do three simple activities – run, jump and throw – is the key to their being able to enjoy other physical activities, from dance to golf to hockey.
Under this strategy, by the time children are about 11, they'll have the proper psychomotor development and skills needed to play sports, he said.
Instead, adults impose their rules on children, forcing them to play sports by adult rules. Under that formula, only the elite kids who can handle it are able to succeed at sports, the professor said.
He cites Canada's Kyle Shewfelt, Olympic gold medallist in gymnastics, as an example of the one-third of Canadians who were physically active as a child.
At age six, before starting school, Shewfelt was asked by a coach where he learned to do a handspring. "In the backyard," Shewfelt answered. Parents, teachers and coaches nurtured the naturally gifted athlete to success at the Olympic floor event.
The CIHI report notes physical activity among children and youth is often linked to school settings. While 54 per cent of all Canadian schools reported in 2001 that they had a policy to offer daily phys-ed classes, only 16 per cent actually did so, according to the study. And in 1998, only slightly more than one-third of students aged five to 13 walked to school. Supervised programs to walk or cycle to school are another way to fight obesity.
The Canadian Association for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance recommends 150 minutes a week of physical education, but only one in five schools meets the requirement. On average, schools offer about 25 minutes of the huffing and puffing-type physical activity needed to keep the heart and lungs fit, said the association's Terry McGuinty.
So far, daily phys-ed is required until graduation in Quebec, and Alberta plans to mandate it by 2005.
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