Advocating for physical education while social distancing at the same time seems impossible, but it’s doable. Your curriculum is going to look different, and you’re going to have to adapt to the new normal.

I’m a member of various PE groups online, and while some professionals are jumping at the chance to embrace change, others are scared out of their mind about how they will move forward in their teaching careers.

But now is not the time to throw in the towel. We need to be advocating for physical education more than ever right now!

Lets not forget physical education is not just a class where you play basketball and volleyball all hour. A PE teachers job is to EDUCATE their students on how to live a healthy and productive life.

Classes should revolve around three domains of learning: psychomotor, affective and cognitive.

• Psychomotor: the physical component of learning which includes coordination, aspects of movement and motor skills. An example would be a baby learning how to crawl, while a child learns to ride a bike. As a person matures, demonstrating skills should become more challenging in relation to age.

• Affective: relates to emotional learning and development and the progress we make learning how to express our feelings and emotions as we get older. An example would be a kindergartner sharing space and equipment with their peers, while a high schooler exhibits moral and ethical conduct in competitive situations such as intentional fouls or performing enhancing substances.

• Cognitive: the development of new knowledge and mental skills. Our capacity to learn new information increases as we get older. Examples in PE would include a 3rd grader understanding the importance of a warm up and cool down, while a high schooler understands how body systems interact with each other during physical activity.

When you understand what these domains are, you will be able to teach your classes with ease. They are the framework of the Physical Education National Standards.

Cutting Physical Education From Schools

This is a HUGE concern for physical educators right now, although it’s nothing new. Higher ups have been cutting the arts programs for quite some time seeing no value in what specialty teachers teach.

It’s usually do to budget cuts. But when the obesity rate in children ages 6-19 has tripled in the last 30 years due to inactivity, unhealthy eating habits and lack of physical education, I find it very hard to believe that PE ranks near the bottom.

Overweight and Obesity Stats in Children

Overweight or obese children are often at risk for cardiovascular disease due to high blood pressure and high cholesterol. They also are at risk for type 2 diabetes, breathing problems including asthma and sleep apnea, joint problems, musculoskeletal discomfort, and fatty liver disease.

Other issues include psychological problems such as anxiety and depression, low self-esteem, lower self-reported quality of life, and social problems such as bullying.

Unfortunately if you are obese as a child, you are more likely to be obese as an adult. You are now have a greater risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes and cancer.

The problem is that some of these children are uneducated on the benefits of physical activity or they don’t have a quality PE program at their school. Whether that’s because of a not so enthusiastic teacher, or they only get PE once a week.

So What Should PE Look Like in Schools?

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recommends 150 minutes of INSTRUCTIONAL physical education for elementary students and 225 minutes per week for middle and high school. Currently no states adhere to these national guidelines at all grade levels.

PE keeps getting cut, students aren’t showing progression therefore you have no solid evidence to prove students NEED PE. It’s nearly impossible to show progression on certain skills when you only see your students once a week.

But physical education NEEDS to be a constant in a child’s life. The overwhelming statistics of obesity affecting every 1 in 5 children in the U.S. should outrage people. This is why advocating for physical education is so important now more than ever, because it’s only getting worse!

The CDC states that when a student gets a quality physical education, they can begin to increase their level of physical activity outside of school, increase their testing scores and stay on task while in the classroom.

They also put out a great visual on how to strengthen PE in schools, that you can find HERE. But the biggest take away I got from the PDF was the following policies on HOW to strengthen physical education.

Basically, all of the recommendations say OFFER PE.

State Policies Requiring Physical Activity

Most states have policies that recommend students engage in PA (physical activity) during the school week. Unfortunately only a few states have laws put in place making PA mandatory.

In 2017, The National Institute on Child Health and Human Development found schools are more likely to have the recommended amount of physical education and recess each week if they are located in states with laws either mandating or encouraging physical education, or PE, or recess.

Sadly, the research also concluded that PE time and recess time were inversely related in the schools studied, suggesting schools replace one form of physical activity for another rather than providing the suggested amount of both.

The above graphic shows that not enough states are providing enough PA, PE and reces time for their students.

It blows my mind how many people think PA is not important when it comes to academics.

As a PE teacher, it’s your job to be actively advocating for physical education, and educate others on the importance of what you do. Because some people genuinely don’t understand.

That Includes Advocating For Recess Too

Currently there are 5 states that require mandatory recess and by law, it cannot be taken away from the students.

Another 7 states require 20-30 minutes of daily physical activity, but leave it up to the schools on how to build that into the students’ days.

Not only should us PE teachers advocate for their content area, because of the benefits but I believe we should also stress the importance of recess and PA through unstructured play.

In 2019, Brittany Shammas studied research articles that found, “children that have unstructured time during the school day exhibit greater creativity and problem-solving skills, are less disruptive, and learn crucial social lessons like how to resolve disputes and form cooperative relationships”.

There is so much evidence that movement is important for students to have throughout their day.

PE teachers teach movement. Our content is essential!

How Should I be Advocating for Physical Education?

FIRST:

Start small scale.

One of my first challenges was changing the wording of what class they were even taking. When I got to my current school, everyone had “gym” and Friday’s were always “Free Play Fridays”. I don’t see my students enough to have every Friday be a free day.

I am also not one of the PE teachers that will cut you off mid sentence to correct you and tell you I teach Physical Education, when you said I teach gym.

BUT, your students need to know the difference. And they need to know what Physical Education means. Helping young kids understand that a solid PE program introduces you to a wide variety of sports, games, skills and activities vs. we just play volleyball and basketball can be challenging. But it needs to be done.

Every time you see a class welcome them to PHYSICAL EDUCATION class, and throughout your time with them question them on what the purpose of your class is. This can be a simple question during activity time or during line up. Don’t actually spend ten minutes every class period on what you teach.

SECOND:

Change the culture of your school.

If you read some of the threads on the PE Central Facebook group, you’ll get to see a lot of drama about faculty belittling teachers about not being a “real teacher”.

You are another teacher in the building and you should always be treated as one. This includes colleagues seeing value in what you teach.

There are teachers who will straight up tell you, “you’re just a gym teacher” and “what you teach isn’t important”……yes real adults say this to PE teachers (luckily no one has said that to my face yet). But the point is, you need to help them understand your role in the building.

Instead of being the “roll out the balls gym teacher”. Be the excited, energetic physical education teacher ready to make your students lives longer, healthier and stronger.

You could also provide the staff with healthy habits challenges, or just give them tips on how to stay active in their own classrooms!

Also, have lesson plans EVERY day. Don’t wake up and wonder what your students will be doing today. Be organized and prepared. Show the teachers why you earned the title physical education TEACHER.

What if you do all of the above already? Then reach further to bring more to the table. I’m not talking about living at school and putting 12 hour workdays in. When I am able to leave my job site at 4:00 pm I don’t stay a second longer. I prioritize my work throughout the day, and I’m always ready for the next day, and upcoming week.

I’m talking about introducing new ideas into PE, throwing parties, being involved with students in the classroom, asking for change for the better, while staying upbeat and positive.

Third:

Do your research. Then present it.

You went to school and earned a bachelors or masters in education, so I’m sure you were taught why our content is important. Now dig deeper.

When I obtained my masters degree in Physical Education Teaching Emphasizing on Adventure Education I learned so much more while writing my thesis. I learned how to do research and was able to present facts about physical activity in a professional way.

My work was even published this May 2020 in The Physical Educator!

This being said, start digging around and find statistics and facts that relate to what and how you teach. Present them to your admin, principal, superintendent, board of education and state legislators.

Another way to show your contents worth is to get involved with your districts reopening task force. Research the guidelines and have multiple plans of action that you are willing to take in the upcoming school year to ensure your students get a valuable physical education.

Share your plans with other PE teachers in your district while being proactive to gain support for your content.

You may have to collaborate on a new curriculum. But it will be worth it if done correctly.

Fourth:

Empower other teachers in your content area. Be a mentor.

I’m sure everyone has a mentor they look up to that helped them get to where they are now.

A great advocate for physical educators is someone others look up to. They inspire change or greatness, and motivate other PE teachers to do more or be better.

I started this blog to be a resource for teachers around the world.

My goal is to show the importance of physical activity, and by doing that hopefully others will understand why physical education in schools is needed. The tag line right at the top of this blog is “PE isn’t just gym class”.

It’s so much more.

And as a fellow PE teacher reading this, it’s our job to PROVE the importance of what we teach.

For those of you saying it’s not my job to prove anything. I got the degree and I just want to clock in and clock out. I’ll have to disagree with you.

PE teachers will always be the underdog of the education world if we keep letting people think all we do is let our students play dodgeball and don’t provide any value to the school besides being the “teacher prep relievers”.

Get Started

Out of the four ways I described advocating for physical education, figure out how you want to present your work to others then get started.

You’ll never see a shortage of math teacher positions, because in education, math testing is high on the worlds priority list.

But if students math testing scores keep dropping every year even though schools have added a ton more classroom instruction time, maybe it’s time to start believing the research that tells us physical activity and PE will help improve those scores.

It’s time to help our kids live happier, healthier and smarter lives. Start advocating for physical education!

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