Gym class in school

[the sound]

From the looks of it, PE is taught very differently in Australia then in America. We spend a lot of the time developing skills to assist us in Sport. We also have a lot of Swimming tuition, Weight training and developing our own sports. We also don't justplay your regular sports like Basketball, or constantly play dodgeball. We play stranger sports, including Ultimate Frisbee, Lacrosse and your version of Football. We also don't climb ropes in PE, or have to take showers, or generally tease the fat kids (Not that we have many in our society).

 

We also don't grade PE, they just asses our physical ability (Beep test, Curl Ups, 40 m sprint, etc.)

 

I for one really enjoy PE, as do most people in our school.

[spaceace12]

In high school, it isn't like that. They do individual sports, or when I was in High School. One week it could be Basketball, then test about rules on it. Then onto another sport.

[sfotkid]

I get my exercise walking around theme parks all day!

[coaster05]

I love the responses about how unfair it would be to grade gym based on your ability, or making it harder to get an A if you are not good at sports. Correct me if I am wrong on this, but remember I teach, but isn't an A in math achieved due to the fact that you have a lot of ability in math. Isn't your math grade based on more then just coming to class everday with your supplies. IMO a PE grade should be higher for those who are better at certain activities. I am really tired of hearing how unfair it is for "Steve" who is not good at sports to always feel bad about that because "Mark" gets all the props for being a good athlete. How about the rest of the day where "Mark" struggles in class but "Steve" rips through things because he is naturally smart. Why do we feel bad for Steve, but not as bad for Mark. More importantly why have we watered down PE to the point that the one thing "Mark" used to love about school, the one place he got to shine has been taken away from him. Making school even worse then it was before all because for 1 hour "Steve" didn't get to be the genius because he had awful hand/eye coordination.

 

Wake up people not everyone can be good at everything. I sucked hard at Art and never had a chance for an A in any art class I was forced to take. I did my best and got on with my life. I survived the traumatic experience just fine and grew from the experience.

 

Rich "We all have strengths and weaknesses" Bitner

[cobra_roll06]

I always enjoyed PE. Mainly just because it was a skive and it was such a laugh. It always either the guys playing Soccer or Basketball and the girls doing Gymnastics or Dance. Unfortunately, when choosing my "Standard Grade" subjects, I had to drop PE as it clashed with my other subjects, but still got 1 class per week since well, McDonalds ain't getting any healthier and the new PlayStation 720 Mega Aquatrax console that forces you to play till 2012 with no hours of sleep is just being released.

[Tanks4me05]

^^ But exactly how many people are going to train and be proffessional athletes when they are older? Sure you would probably say how many people are going to be lawyers when they are older - but there are a heck of a lot more lawyers (and most other jobs actuallly) than there are Athletes. I see school is one that focuses on academic capabilities, and although I know that physical prowess should be stressed especially in America, but there can be several circumstances in which the child can't preform well, be it any medical condition requiring that student to do so. I see Gym not as a class to get an actual grade in (although the free 100 average is really nice) but simply more of an area for excersize, to keep us fatties in shape. (Although I am not one who is overweight) Sure, 40 minutes isn't a lot of time to do pphysical activity, and the sheer size of our Gym classes limit the amount of time each student gets to actually do stuff (The kids nearing the back half of the line to kick in Kick Ball don't kick at all - my gym class is around 40 - and that's not counting the girls in the other side of the gym.) There are a lot of problems in which Gym is set up in America, but if the students were graded on how good they were in sports, I could say that for this reason, the Honors Society size would probably go down from almost 300 to probably about 50 - 100. These are students with an overall average of 90 and no grades below an 85. Having well over half of the kids kicked out just for poor sports preformance (me being one of them for most of it) would be a bad idea. Besides, quite a few of the people who don't do sports really well are freaking smart, and I think I could be considered one of them, so that would be quite unfair to those who have a higher intelligence/achievability in school. Besides, I'm actually pretty strong and physically fit, I just can't play sports really well. (I can't run long distances, though.)

[King of Ka]

I personally have always loved gym class. I'm one of those people who isn't very good at sports, but I put forth a lot of effort, and I enjoy it.

[coaster05]

^^Again your post, while well written, proves my point. Why should the gym grade be based almost entirely on effort, while the math grade is almost based entirely on how you perform. Why the difference? I am also not saying that if you come to gym everyday and try your best that you should get anything lower than a B, but you should not get the same grade as the student who totally excels in gym. I also don't view gym as a training ground or prep class to be a pro athlete. Gym is so far away from the idea of any organized sport it is rediculous, let alone what a pro athlete does. Comparing the two illustrates what is wrong with the idea of gym in this country.

 

I agree there are several reasons why a child can't perform well in gym, but there are also several reasons why a child can't perform well in math. Why in one case is that ok and the student should not be punished and still receive the highest grade and in the other instance you are just constantly told to "try harder"?

 

I look at it like this, most people seem to think that as long as you come to gym and put forth the effort you should get an A, because you somehow believe you shouldn't have any negative effects for not being good at gym. So for the entire semester, with several different activites, including things such as running, swimming, biking, bowling, and the countless other examples I have seen on here, are you saying that NONE of these activities you can do well at all since, you are not good in sports?

 

Now imagine you go to math class and you bust your hump to study for every test, complete all you homework to a very high standard, and even do extra work at home to make sure you are totally ready for the class. Then you find out the kid next to you also receives an A because everyday he came to class he remembered to get his calculator and book out of his locker (like being dressed for gym) and he placed his name on each paper and "attempted" all the problems even though few were right (kind of like acting there is no way a gym teacher could teach you enough to make a free throw) and now that student also receives an A because it is not really fair that his academic standard is hurt because he is "not really good at math".

 

If the "gym rules" applied to all of school there would be no point in doing anything other then following the dress code and showing up on time to recieve perfect marks.

 

Rich "I teach every core subject " Bitner

[Cameron]

Chalk me up as someone who didn't like PE. I was a pretty nerdy kid (no, really I was!) and liked just taking it easy. Fortunately I was (and still am) naturally thin, so I didn't need to do a lot of sport (at least not as far as weight goes - I won't deny that I was pretty unfit).

 

However I was an excellent runner (sprinting, not long distance) and swimmer too (still true in both cases). The PE coach always wanted me to run and swim for the school, but I just wasn't interested. I'm still torn on the issue, I think on one hand it's good to push the kids to do stuff and work out (stay in shape, basically) - but forcing 30 kids to run around in the mud playing football just seems unnecessary.

 

Interestingly I'm still not a fan of most of the sports we had to play at school ((Australian) football, soccer, basketball, cricket, etc), but I am way more active now. Swimming, cycling, karate and such. So I think that for me it was less about being a stupid, lazy teen, and more about not being offered stuff I was good at. (Ok, it was SOMEWHAT about being a stupid, lazy teen.. )

 

As I mentioned earlier, I am now quite active; and as a result I'm in the best shape I've been in my whole life (mentally as well as physically). I don't know how gym is taught now, but for us it was the stereotypical "get out there and play, otherwise you're a total loser/wuss/retard/etc". I think that attitude was a big part of my apathy.

 

Cameron.

[nay]

I hated gym class with a passion. I was always trying to come up with new excuses on how I could get out of class. I was a fat kid and was terrible at any and all sports. No one wanted me on their team, so I was picked last whenever we had to do that. Yeah, those were some good times.

[thomas2]

I pretty much hated it. We had to play rugby during winter in the snow with only a t-shirt and shorts.

[SonOfBeastSucks]

I got my two required semesters of high school gym out of the way the summer before my freshman year. They just let you do whatever. I usually just ran and lifted weights with my friends. It was fine.

[steel]

^^Again your post, while well written, proves my point. Why should the gym grade be based almost entirely on effort, while the math grade is almost based entirely on how you perform. Why the difference?

The difference is that in a math class, everyone starts at the same level and works up. Everyone has to learn all of the same things.

Take two students. One is an eighth grade boy who participates in track. The other is an eleventh grade boy who hates sports and does not get much physical activity outside of gym.

Give the eighth grader a sheet of vectors and his head will probably explode. Make the eleventh grader run a mile and his lungs will want to collapse.

Eighth graders don't have to know how to use vectors. Eleventh graders should. They're in different math classes.

Both of their gym classes require that they run the mile.

Everyone is at different levels in gym.

[coasterdude5]

Ah my wellness class for my freshman year was awesome! Every year I wish I could take it again. It was during 4th period so it was actually an hour and a half instead of an hour. Play some basketball, ultimate frisbee, etc. then we'd break out the cards for E.R.S. and alot of other games.

[Tanks4me05]

I pretty much hated it. We had to play rugby during winter in the snow with only a t-shirt and shorts.

 

Wow. I'm not sure how much snow Belgium gets, but I assume that it gets about as cold as over where I live. September, October, and maybe some November are the days we go outside, (although we did have a few relatively warm days in December so we went outside then) but then we stop completely until around the end of March or sometime in April when it regularly reaches about 50 degrees Fahrenheit - about 15 - 18 degrees Celsius.

[thomas2]

I pretty much hated it. We had to play rugby during winter in the snow with only a t-shirt and shorts.

 

Wow. I'm not sure how much snow Belgium gets, but I assume that it gets about as cold as over where I live. September, October, and maybe some November are the days we go outside, (although we did have a few relatively warm days in December so we went outside then) but then we stop completely until around the end of March or sometime in April when it regularly reaches about 50 degrees Fahrenheit - about 15 - 18 degrees Celsius.

 

We always had to go outside in january and february. But during fall and spring we went inside. It didn't make any sense!

[socalMAN123]

Our class is so easy it's not even funny. If you don't goof off and get the teacher pissed off, you get an A. It's as easy as that.

---Brent

[canadianfreak]

If you have ever seen the movie Mr. Woodcock, he resembles my old gym teacher. Except for the whole marrying my mother deal.

 

He was pretty hard on us and made fun of the larger kids. I was glad to switch out of that class into Food and Nutrition Science.

[lapseofreason]

I HATED gym. I was the kid that always got picked last and shoved in the outfield or whatever. Also, I pretty much suck at sports; I can shoot baskets and that's about it. I remember getting in a fight with a cheerleader (that was in a lower grade than me, no less) for like a whole semester because I sucked so bad at volleyball and she couldn't figure out why "I wasn't trying". LOL.

[tinkerbell]

I've never been a fan of sports or running (not to mention the fact that I'm not too good at either), so needless to say, I hated gym. My friends and I were always coming up with excuses to get out of whatever activity the class was doing (we would usually just walk the track instead). Somehow I always managed to get an A though...probably because I had easy teachers who didn't really care what we did as long as we didn't piss them off. But I'm so glad gym isn't required for all 4 years of high school.