What's behind the backlash against health/nutrition issues in the schools?

Great Debates
101

Really? My dad said he was allowed to do this when he was a kid, but only if you lived within walking distance, and that was only because the school didn’t have a cafeteria. (This would have been back in the fifties)

No offense, Una, but I don’t know of any school that allows this around here.

Banning kids from bringing their own lunches in, and banning certain items, now THAT’S completely retarded.
One thing I DO remember from Catholic school was the amount of food they gave you – and they were very big on the whole “clean your plate” mentality. Despite the fact that the portions were huge. I remember getting a stomach ache when a nun insisted I finish the slab of pizza I bought.

My mother sees that now (she’s an aid at a local school). They give these young kids huge amounts of food, and not too many of them can finish everything. (Most of it’s crap, again, like footlong hot dogs, nachos, pizza, etc)

And I don’t know if you still see this trend, but some schools have allowed fast food companies to sell products in their cafeterias. Mine had Pizza Hut. (This was after I graduated). Some have McDonalds, Taco Bell, etc. If THAT isn’t contributing to the problem, I’ll eat my slippers. (And they’re probably more nutritious!)

You know, my aunt’s a dietitician for a school district. Does anyone want me to ask her her opinion of the whole thing? I won’t ask her for details of her school, mind you, but just how she feels about it.

102

That was more the point of my original post. The governor in question has slashed every part of the education budget he can, but then finds the money to track how much kids weigh. IMO all that will accomplish is pointing fingers at poor people, when some part of that money could possibly have had positive results.

103

The PE system in America is totally flawed and worthless when it comes to actually educating kids about physical fitness, because it’s still, as far as I know, fixated on sports and making kids “participate” in sports like baseball, basketball, football, soccer, etc. Most of the time that means the few genuinely athletic kids (who get their exercise in sports practices already) playing against each other, and all the other kids just standing around doing nothing. Especially in sports like soccer and basketball, it’s easy for kids to just stand around.

This is totally, totally worthless. Making the kids play a certain sport each week or day of gym class accomplishes nothing. If a kid wants to play a sport, then he can join the team.

PE class should consist of a series of physical exercises roughly analogous to the PT during military basic training. There should be absolutely no “games” dimension to it whatsoever. A typical day could be, stretches, a few warm-up laps, then sprints, then a series of pushups, situps, mountain climbers, bicycle kicks, or whatever the teacher decides to throw at them…or free weights, or some other strength activity. Strength days and calisthenics days could alternate. Absolutely no standing-around allowed.

Students would bitch about a gym class like this, but it would be effective.

104

We had a class like that offered as an elective. I took it, and so did many others in my high school.

105

But do you really want to make kids hate exercise and grow up with the idea that physical activity sucks? There’s nothing wrong with playing games, it’s just HOW they’re implemented.

Your idea will only teach them that exercise is painful so why bother?

106

The fundamentals of common sports should certainly be part of the PE curriculum though they should not be the beginning and end of it.

That sounds like a fantastic idea if you want kids to hate PE. If the idea is to teach them about physical fitness then giving them a variety of fun things to do would probably work better than boring physical exercises.

107

Bullshit. They would see the results of the training on their own bodies, and that would make them like it. Fat kids would lose weight; skinny weaklings would gain some muscle; it would also help them gain confidence. I totally disagree that my approach would make them hate exercise over the long term. I realize they would hate it at first, but that’s true with a lot of good things.

Also, it wouldn’t need to be “painful.” It could start out with fairly basic and easy exercises and gradually work up to more strenuous ones, at least for the kids who are out of shape.

[QUOTE=Odesio]
The fundamentals of common sports should certainly be part of the PE curriculum though they should not be the beginning and end of it.

[/QUOTE]

Why? Those common sports have zero practical application. Zero.

It’s ridiculous that there are mandatory high school classes that teach games. Are there mandatory classes where they make students play chess? Pool? Warcraft?

108

Sports are a part of our culture, and schools do tons of teaching about culture. Learning them can be very practical- many adults continue to be involved in sports (even if it is just coaching T-Ball for their kids.) Teaching sports is one of the better ways to build a culture of physical fitness. Remember, the goal here is not simply to make kids at this moment fit. The goal is to have those kids integrate fitness into their lives forever, and to teach their kids. Mandatory drills probably are not a great way to do this.

I agree that the way most school PE classes are taught isn’t great. But the answer is to offer a wider variety of classes, not to make it even more unpleasant.

109

I was an athlete all the way through high school. I hated running long distances and only did so because it was part of my training regiment. Some of the PT exercises were fun and I was happy to do those almost every single day. What I liked to do more than anything else was play an actual sport.

[quote]

Why? Those common sports have zero practical application. Zero.

Many of these sports–football, soccer, baseball, etc., etc.-- are culturally relevant. As a child, I certainly payed many of those games outside of a school setting and we followed the rules as best we could. I don’t think these sports should be the alpha and omega of PE, but I don’t see why the shouldn’t be part of the curriculum.

Ah, I was envisioning PE starting much earlier than high school.

110

My kids’ PE classes (which they had from 1st grade on) have a much larger fitness component. They do also include games. Movement for health does not need to be boot camp and done right team sports can achieve fitness goals, allow kids to have fun, and even help kids learn how to work together. It does not have to be nerd humiliation. I think the sort that my kids have had is increasingly the norm.

Compared to the totality of our society these are small steps, true, but they all add up.

111

You bring up a good point. For this reason, I think that gym should be mandatory for all students not on sports teams. The guys on teams should have to take another class instead of gym - ideally an intellectual class (they could choose between things like debate, law, government, or certain specialized history courses - maybe even the history of sports, or even histories of individual sports like baseball or football.) But it should be something that requires them using their heads.

Too many of the athletes in high schools are very dumb. And far too many of the intellectual kids are physically weak and/or overweight, or have poor posture and bad kinetics. There needs to be a way of getting both of those groups to develop the skills they lack, instead of, as is too often the case, using one to make up for the other.

112

In Texas during the 1990s, gym was a requirement for every student as part of the standard high school curriculum. In lieu of gym, students could take Athletics (football, basketball, wrestling, whatever), ROTC, marching band and no doubt other classes I’m just not aware of.

High school students in Texas were all required to take an American Government class. All high school students in Texas are required to take certain classes in order to graduate which include some science, English, fine arts, etc., etc. So they got it covered.

113

Former PE teacher here, and I have good news and bad news.

**Good news: **

Well planned and executed PE classes look very different from what we went through when we were kids. They’re not all about sports. They do include instruction and modified versions of various sports and games, but the emphasis is on everyone moving and actively participating, not standing around waiting for a turn. The really good ones include knowledge tests too.

Bad news:

It’s a very slow section of education to change, and a lot of PE programs are pretty worthless.

Commentary

I do believe PE programs can do a lot of good when they’re done well. I’ve seen them. But I think some of the ideas put forth here are a little quaint. With all due respect Argent Towers, your idea of a gym class consisting of military PT type activities has been tried. In the business we refer to it as “what was always done until relatively recently”.

Traditional (in my opinion, lame) PE classes consisted of calisthenics, running a few laps and playing a sport game which was a waste of time for most of the class. Thankfully, we’re getting away from that. A well run PE class now has a warm up, a fitness component, some type of skill instruction, and an activity / game.

The other problem with the “PT model” is that studies have shown no matter how good the PE program is, it won’t necessarily lead to measurable fitness gains during a school year. This raises the question, ‘why have PE at all then?’ The answer is, to give students a grounding in how to exercise over a lifetime and, encourage them to do so, and inform them about topics relevant to fitness, health and nutrition.

Which brings us back to the point of this thread. PE can do a very good job educating on nutrition. I made this a focus when I was teaching, but it was not lost on me that the kids left the gym only to encounter the crappy food in the cafeteria. I felt sort of undermined.

I’ve participated in boards planning the cafeteria menus. It is indeed all about money.

EDIT: About the athletes not having to take PE. Everything I know about that issue tells me it’s a bad idea. I can elaborate if anyone is interested, but I don’t want to further hijack this thread.

114

In my city kids were allowed to go home for lunch until the late 1980’s. I did it until 7th grade.

At least the kids got some extra exercise.

115

I am very liberal, so liberal in fact, that I don’t quite believe in letting capricious, pseudoscintific, and socio-monetary-politico entities decide, mandate, and dictate what is “allowed” to pass through mine, and mine love-ed’s lips.I think many are misguided in these schizophrenic and unsubstantiated times of “one size fits all” and trully irresponsible “scientific mandate”- it is the homogeniztion of America for facist and capitulating reasons… What might be good for one is not necessarily good for another on genetic and cultural terms. I will outlast ye all.

As a Democat, this food fascism is one thing I will vehemently oppose.

116

I scream, Gattaca !!!

117

Oh, I wasn’t doubting you, just saying that I never heard of that, at least not in my area. We weren’t even allowed to eat outside of the cafeteria.

Argent Towers, bullshit yourself. They’re not going to “see the results and it’ll make them like it.” First, you have to prove that this will GET results. Then, again, not everyone is going to be motivated to even care about the “results”, if they hate it.

118

Also, I think that turning weak kids into strong kids, through mandatory weight and stamina training, would virtually eliminate bullying. Almost all bullying is directed at kids who are perceived to be too weak to fight back.

An hour a day of real physical exercise will get results.

119

Thank you for answering the question that the OP posed.

Here is your answer, Indygrrl. What’s behind the backlash against schools providing healthier lunches?

Those who identify as Republicans cannot even grasp what the issue is in the first place, and assume that it involves the government coming into our homes to ask what we’re feeding our kids for breakfast.

Ignorance. That’s what’s behind the backlash.

120

An hour? More like 20 minutes or so, by the time you get dressed, get out to the gym, and get everyone organized. Then ten minutes before the end of the period, they had to let you go back to the locker room to change so you wouldn’t be late for the next class.
When I was in school, each period was 45 minutes, except for fifth period. That was an hour and a half, which was split up into three lunch periods. (2nd lunch was best, because you went to class, got a lunch break, and then came back to class.)

Trust me, we did some of what you described. And I didn’t see the results you speak of.