What Every Parent Should Know About Gym Class

Twenty years ago, the words "gym class" conjured up a simple image -- a stern coach leading gray-shirted squadrons through jumping jacks. Today, that image is antique. Physical education has evolved and grown more diverse. At some schools now, there are excellent health-conscious instructors who aim to start kids on a lifetime of fitness; at others, there is no funding at all for P.E. Parents need to become good fitness advocates by heeding the following tips:

• Find out what's happening in your child's P.E. class.
• Make sure your children actually get some fitness benefit from gym class.
• Are your kids learning activities that they might actually continue throughout their lives?

Talk to your kids
"Ask them, 'Do you like P.E.?'" advises Susan Kalish, director of the American Running and Fitness Association. "Kids naturally like to exercise and, if your child doesn't enjoy P.E., he's probably not getting much out of it. You should ask him, 'Why don't you like it?' and then you should talk to the instructor."

Support equality
Perhaps the world's worst sport is dodgeball, or murderball. In it, a player "kills" another by pelting her with a ball. The least agile players inevitably die early on, and then just sit, embarrassed, on the bleachers. Parents should lobby against such elimination games, advises Judith Young, director of the National Association for Sport and Physical Education. "P.E. teachers," Young says, "need to make gym class comfortable for all children by grading tasks. If you're throwing balls at targets, for instance, let some kids stand closer."

Make sure they're active
In a 1993 study, Bruce G. Simons-Morton, a researcher at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, found that, in an average P.E. class, students were physically active only 8.6 percent of the time. "Teachers tend to want to control their students," Simons-Morton explains, "They like to have them clumped together."

Simons-Morton advocates an alternative, "organized chaos." Classes, he prescribes, should be split into small groups so that soccer matches are two-on-two. A recent study showed that, by making such changes, P.E. teachers were able to increase kids' active time to more than 50 percent. "But it's really hard work for the teacher," he warns. Parents can help by becoming gym-class volunteers, and supervising small groups of children.

Promote lifetime sports
Over the past 15 years, progressive P.E. teachers have increasingly turned away from sports like football and wrestling to embrace swimming, cycling, and tennis -- in other words, activities that students are likely to continue for an entire lifetime. "Teachers should help kids develop a level of competence in several lifetime sports," argues Kalish, "so that when they're older, they can, say, go to a hotel that has a badminton net and think, 'Oh, I know how to play that!'" P.E. teachers should also teach kids why exercise is important, adds Young. "If they do that," she reasons, "kids will be more motivated to stay fit."

Do your homework
"Students aren't going to get all the activity they need in P.E.," says Young, "and parents need to reinforce lessons," by asking teachers for homework. A typical instructor might tell you to practice throwing -- to have your child make ten overhand and ten underhand throws each afternoon, for example -- or he might, alternatively, advise you to supplement gym class with activities like after-school soccer and karate class. "Exercise needs to happen daily," explains Kalish, "and most kids now go to gym only two or three times a week. Parents need to make sure their children stay active on the other days. It's hard work, but it's worth it."

More on: Sports for Elementary-School Kids