I taught middle school P.E. for over ten years. Sorry so many of you have had such a bad experience. My students probably didn’t enjoy my classes that much. I had at least 45 students in each class. I usually had at least one class with 60 or more students. The principal arranged the master schedule in a way that made the afternoon classes especially large. With 45 - 60 middle school students, it is almost impossible for a mere mortal to “teach”. We checked role, exercised, ran two laps, ran through one rotation of skills and drills, and then organized a game(s). Some students acted like they disliked P.E. We insisted that they dress-out and participate anyway. We offered a “walk and talk” for students on a regular basis. The intention was to encourage them to get the heart rate up and break a sweat. Some students did what we asked of them and some just ambled along. We failed to meet the needs of all students. We tried to offer opportunities that appealed to a wide range of interests.
I think kids need more fitness activities. The lack of strength and stamina is pretty shocking. I taught in an urban area and many of my students did not have safe, outdoor play and exercise opportunities away from school.
I was also a fat kid. I hated gym class, and the teacher hated fat kids. He would make us run laps until we couldn’t take any more, then when we were done, as we were trying to catch our breath he would always yell, “Let’s go, let’s go, don’t die on me! Walk it off!” Until one day a classmate laid down on the grass infield after running laps, trying to catch her breath. As everyone walked over to the teacher to see what hell we had to go through next, she did not get up. He yelled his usual, “Let’s go, let’s go, don’t die on me! Walk it off!” but she did not get up. She died of a heart attack at 15 years old. He never said that again.
Were you in my high school? My teacher pulled that crap, too. Sorry, you don’t take a bunch of 14-15 YO’s who’ve never done gymnastics and try to force them to learn at that age. I got hurt trying to vault the horse. Took a couple of years for the hand that got smashed to heal properly. She finally stopped it after two of the heavy girls fell on her while she was trying to spot them.
I’m sure there’s a major new market for therapy waiting to be developed, catering for the thousands of people whose first taste of real-life horror was their school experiences of gym, P.E., ‘games’ or whatever other euphemism may apply to cruel physical torture inflicted by sadists on defenceless children.
My ‘schooling’ took place in the north-west of England, which is a harsh, cold, wet place for the most part. To be sent on very long ‘cross country runs’ during the depths of Winter was deeply, horribly unpleasant for anyone who wasn’t already quite a skilled runner. I wasn’t a fat kid or particularly lacking in fitness, but I just wasn’t interested in P.E. and saw it as something of a waste of time. I still have very vivid and unpleasant memories of P.E. sadism, and of ending up colder and more uncomfortable than I ever thought was possible.
The thing is, in later life I developed a genuine interest in physical fitness and learned a lot about the different kinds of exercise, what each was good for, how to put together my own fitness programme, and also about fitness, diet and nutrition. None of this stuff, which is interesting and useful, was ever taught at school. It was just a case of getting changed and then going out on to the Lancashire moors trying to for 45 or 90 minutes getting so cold my bones froze together, or trying to play soccer on a ‘pitch’ of frozen mud. What was the point? None at all.
Washte, Coach’s murder was horrible and I don’t think they ever caught the perp. But his words “Don’t wish your life away,” have even more meaning for me because of it. I think it’s in line with the idea of “To everything there is a season.”
I had a fantastic P.E. teacher in college. But for some reason, she wouldn’t let me smoke in her classroom.
I don’t think he sounds like such a bad guy. So he wanted kids to keep moving; it’s not like he was forcing people to run at top speed for hours. Yelling “walk it off” doesn’t make somebody a bastard. He probably blamed himself for that girl’s death (as evidenced by his changed behavior afterward), but to have a heart attack at 15 usually means that there was some sort of internal birth defect. So she could’ve died at any time. It probably wasn’t his fault at all.
Just recently my PE teacher told us that “I can browse as long as I don’t purchase.” to a class of freshman when asked why he was checking out the senior girls. This sick man also is the girls’ basketball coach. one more time when you need the barf smilie
Most of the gym teachers / coaches at my high school were youngish (mid-to-late twenties), rather attractive males who just happened to be total assholes. Much innuendo was exchanged with flirtatious female students. Dirty dirty dirty. Yeccch.
Oh, and I recall harboring a burning hatred for my disgustingly obese elementary school P.E. instructor, “Mr. Mike.” Who the hell makes second graders run laps all period?
In the (High) school I attended we had four male gym teachers, one asshole, two incompetent, and one a fairly good guy. The good guy (Coach Bill) contracted Polio and, this is true, they let him coach from a wheelchair. Of course he was well loved. The others enjoyed getting us nerds in a dodgeball game every time they could. Jocks would clobber us, and that shit HURT! For some reason if you weren’t a physical person you were inferior.
Hmmmm… Come to think of it, my Drill sergeant was the same way. (?)
YES! You’ve put your finger on an important point. I really felt the actual contempt of some of these teachers just because I was scrawny and terrible at games. These were not nice people, some of them.
