Can kids do gymnastics on the field at playtime?

Elite gymnastics 😂 get a grip.
my daughter went to a local gymnastics club in a leisure centre and was doing hand springs, flips and one handed cartwheels. She’s certainly no elite gymnast 😂 just your average kid who’s brave and flexible. Like most kids.
still think it’s pathetic to be policing this in schools.

Sorry, I thought they were mentioned as potentially dangerous. I don't know the technical terms for gymnastics moves.

Can't believe the flaming you're getting here OP. I can only assume most of these posters haven't been in a school since they were there themselves. Parents complain all the time. All the time. And it will be a personal complaint about you if you weren't supervising in a way they consider adequate.

If the Head has said no, then it's not going to be happening on my watch and I'd raise it if other staff weren't being consistent with the rules. We allow cartwheels and handstands but not tumbling or aerials even on the field. There is the risk of injury to the child themselves as well as the risk of another child getting hurt when they run into the gymnast's path. I'm not a sports specialist - how do I know if a child is doing a skill properly and within their capabilities while not in an appropriate environment?

As a parent, you can let your kids do whatever they like in the park. When I'm responsible for your children, I take the responsibility to keep them safe extremely seriously. And that goes for the school field as well as on school trips, in the classroom/dining room, letting them go home with the correct adult etc. Sorry if that annoys you.

If they are pre-elite gymnasts, a phone call to the gym club could get them a chat from the coach.
The most likely risks are repetitive impact injuries- mats are used to allow repetition without trashing joints.
Also ankle sprains.
If they are rec gymnasts, they get barely 30 minutes a week actually doing skills and may not get to practice this stuff in a suitable setting with a qualified coach. Maybe go a month between doing handsprings/ aerials, so they will try wherever they can.
I was that kid. Still nursing the worn joints um decades later.
Unfortunately cheer and acro dance teachers seem to encourage kids to think it's okay to do mad stuff on hard floors. They seem to have a different expectation of safety.

I don't think that the OP is bothered by the lower level gymnastics (handstands/cartwheels etc). It's the fact that an aerial move - eg a backflip could result in a catastrophic injury (broken neck anyone?) if not executed properly, particularly on grass with no crash mat present. I don't think asking these girls NOT to do such movements without the presence of a qualified coach and crash mats is unreasonable??

Football produces more injuries, but probably not life threatening, whereas if someone breaks their neck doing gymnastics it may well be ??

OP, I think all you can do is to tell children on your watch NOT to do any aerial moves (regardless of competence) and feed this back to your Head teacher. I completely appreciate that sometimes, you can't stop someone from doing something, but if you tell them they're not to do it and there is evidence of an email trail from you to your headteacher/other senior leadership people, then you are covered if anything goes wrong. I don't know what else you can do

I’d agree with this. Lots of fractured wrists from slipping whilst playing football. I think half the boys in my sons class had fractures last autumn. None of them very serious ( green stick fractures) they don’t even pop a plaster cast on anymore just a splint.

It’s not great but better for them to be active overall we have bars and various bits of climbing equipment. I have had a phone call about all my children at various times to say fell, hit head and to keep an eye out at home for signs of concussion but pupils are equal and reactive so seem fine and have had a wet paper towel applied. Again it’s not great that they’ve been injured but Ithink the benefits of getting lots of outdoor exercise outweigh the odd injury.

Not allowed where I work. Mainly because kids flipping about means someone is pretty likely to get a hefty kick in the face. Nor is football allowed at lunch time due to all the arguing it causes and the poor midday supervisors end up stepping in constantly which then mens others aren't getting the supervision and help they need. Is it sad, yeah it is, but if you have to deal with the relentlessness of it you understand.

In answer to your original question....ignoring all the usual aibu ridiculousness....

Our primary did not allow gymnastics other than the basic stuff and it was quite heavily policed. My daughter regularly came home whingeing that she had been told off for it.

I have to say I'd rather my kid not do the more advanced stuff at school because, like you say, there are kids and footballs everywhere and potential for injury.

I wouldn't have blamed the school if they had injured themselves though as I know what she is like..... But I guess a lot of parents would nowadays.

People moaning it's the school ruining kids fun, it's probably more the parents!

Ffs. I actually despair.
No wonder we’ve got a generation of obese, iPad addicted kids if the adults in their life are discouraging this kind of play. It’s actually really fucking sad.

Unfortunately, you are in the minority. The number of complaints we get over what most would class as minor grazes is actually quite sad. I love seeing children play and explore through different exercises, but at the back of my mind is "what would happen if they fell while doing..." So I'm constantly scanning and reminding children to take care. Like I said, it really not my way, and thankfully major accidents are few and far between but if something happens we have paperwork to fill out and I have to explain what happened in detail to our SLT, headteacher, and the parents and I would probably be given a warning for not monitoring the children probably. It's such a sad state of affairs.

I think some posters need to go back to school to improve their reading comprehension, this is not about cartwheels and handstands

I agree with this and YANU OP. Amateur entry level gymnastics fine. But no way would I want kids doing full-on tumbles and aerials on my watch. I’d be getting the head to send an email around both to staff and parents.

Doing a handstand or cartwheel is one thing, doing 6 backflips in a row is quite another. The chance of the child hurting themselves or someone else is much higher.
I would get clarification from the head, they may not realise that gymnastics on the field includes a row of backflips and aerial cartwheels. If you say you're concerned and looking for clarification and they say it's fine then it's down to them if it turns out not to be fine.

Gymnastics has really taken off in the last 20 years or so. Where ballet was the default when I was growing up, I feel like gymnastics is now. The cartwheels, handstands etc we were doing in our 70s /80s playgrounds are nothing compared to the level of gymnastics tumbling that kids achieve now. Aerials etc.

But in a gym club they have spotters to step in if they are not going to land well. And soft mats.

My daughter is complaining that they are not allowed to use the bars anymore at school, but I know full well that they are not just hanging off them upside down like we used to, but practicing soul circles and other moves from uneven bars at their gymnastics club which has a foam pit under the bars not a scattering of wood chips. I don’t blame the school because it’s a playground not a gym…

my daughter is learning aerials now and I won’t let her practice them at home. Uneven surfaces and landing badly could be catastrophic. She does cartwheels and handsprings and works on her over splits and plays on the trapeze and does anything else she can come up with but not aerials. I want her to be totally proficient before she does that in a space with distractions and wet grass and random cats and whatever else we might find in our front garden. They are quite dangerous and very different to a bunch of cartwheels and forward rolls.

Find them a room of cotton wool, and let them roll about it that. I assume you would have an attack of the vapours if anyone played British Bulldog. It’s no wonder kids have no resilience, injuries are part of growing up.

DD broke her arm at school, aged 9 .. fell awkwardly off the Monkey Bars - it was just one of those things. I didn’t sue the school, or demand the kit was dismantled.

As a former TA, I always hated when they did "gymnastics" as we had a child break their arm a few years ago doing it and the memory of his bone sticking through his jumper really stayed with me.

Speak to the head, clarify that some staff have been staying different things and you are worried about safety.

So the kids who enjoy football or other ball sports can play in the field but kids who want to do handstand or cartwheel can't? I wouldn't really describe it as gymnastics necessarily anyway, just kids playing.

Totally normal child behaviour and seems a moderate sensible rule.

Then address the having to tell them multiple times. You shouldn’t have to.