Did you enjoy PE at school?

God no, hated it, I was useless and often bunked off. I’m in awe that my year 8 DD loves it.

I did lots of sport outside of school and was good at it, but I put minimal effort into PE lessons as the teachers were horrible and it wasn’t enjoyable. The teachers mocked girls who were not sporty and the whole watching us shower thing was awful.

Thankfully it didn’t put me off sport and exercise altogether like it did for so many girls. I played a team sport til I was almost 40 and still run, do yoga, fitness classes at the gym etc.

No. I was the chubby, bespectacled kid who was clumsy and unfit. Picked last, under sufferance, for every team. Regularly mocked, scorned or ignored. I realise now I have likely had asthma since childhood, which is what actually made me "unfit", but it has never presented in a way that would make it obvious. I am, late in life, quite a fitness nut but had you told me some years ago that would happen I would have laughed in your face.

Not really, but I'm not much of a team player when it comes to sports! Also, I wasn't a fan of, "You're a girl, so you do netball" when, actually, I'm probably of a better build for rugby. That, and hockey and table tennis were not violent enough for me!

I only recall one teacher that I didn't like, as she reminded me very much of a Mean Girl and only seemed to like the pretty, sports team girls who were happy to get knicker-draft in very short gym skirts. I was really gutted when she swerved out of the way when I hit a rounders ball at her head... that would have made my entire school career if it had hit her in the face 😄

Throw in the sweaty communal changing rooms and inhaling an overdose of teenage body-sprays and deodorants, and it was not for me!

However, I did like some of the more individual sports, like trampolining, and the things that I did out of school.

Hated it.

Had to jog around the school oval before playing football one day. The grass had overgrown and my foot fell into a drain- snapping it sideways. I hobbled back and was told to get on with it and play football. When I pointed out that it was clicking and agonising- she said it was just clicking the ligaments back into place!

Next day, I shuffled into school with crutches and my leg in plaster!

At my school the cool girls were more into clothes / makeup / partying than team sports.

Fair enough @SirChenjins - this was not my experience, but ok.

Yes, I too remember the filthy looks from the sporty girls because I had failed to catch a ball, or whatever it was I was supposed to do. Awful.

Yes, really. Team sports were predominantly played by very confident, very competitive girls at our school - and as a result they quickly became the pets of the PE teachers as the pp said. This gave them the role of bully on the field as the quieter, less sporty and less competitive girls were the last to be chosen for the teams or were screamed at for letting the side down.

Competitive team sports have always attracted a certain type of person - this can't be a revelation, surely?

Wow, really?! At my school you were more likely to be bullied if you were on one of the school sports teams than if you weren't. Being good at sport was considered to be geeky / sucking up / whatever - not one of cool girls at all.

Oh absolutely this. When a woman says she loved team sports as a school pupil it always makes me very wary of her.

Loathed it. Did Latin to get out of it

"The rital humiliation of being the last to be selected onto a team by the bitchy teacher's pets. "

That is secondary PE in a nutshell.

Yes, most of the time. I wasn’t keen on cross country or playing hockey on a muddy field in the rain, but I loved netball, basketball, trampolining, etc. Our PE teachers were great though, all quite young and good fun. This was late 80’s/ early 90’s.

Hated it. But I did Ju Jitsu twice a week for years.

PE is ritual torture for many.

I saw a head teacher interviewed years ago, she ran a girls' school in a not very nice part of Manchester and one of the things she did was over hall the PE so instead of being outside in shorts the girls had options of things like aerobics wearing a track suit if they wanted.

Why is PE never differentiated? group of kids who only have their age in common being expected to play a team sport regardless of how good or bad they are, of how tall / short they are.

No, I hated it. PE lessons made me think I wasn’t good at sport which I realised in later life isn’t true.

"Teaching" was just bellowing random words like "harder!" or "faster!".

I had no idea that you could actually be taught to run until C25k came along and C25k is the opposite of what PE teachers were yelling.
Break it up with walk breaks
Go slower to a level that you can cope with
Build it up gradually

There was no actual coaching.
I'm not counting the time in tennis that I was called over and told to run towards the ball not away from it. I pointed out that if someone threw a brick at you it was entirely reasonable to run away from it not standing there attempting to catch it
Of course I'll bloody well duck or dodge when something hurty is being chucked towards me. Basic self-preservation!

Basically if you were shit in your first lesson in y7, you'd be shit all the way through because of the favouritism culture denying you the range of opportunites to practice and develop.

Being the smallest child in y7 did not help.

Hated it. Am glad to be an adult with all the challenges that it brings just so I don't have to do PE 🤣

It seems to be one of the few subjects where teachers could get away without teaching. We were never shown how to do anything better, be that hitting a ball, running or jumping. No coaching on technique or posture or any attention given on how to avoid injury. You were just expected to instinctively know.

We had one moderately nice PE teacher and the rest were thick lazy twats.

Yes- I liked it because there was no homework! Actually it was ok and I was just averagely competent but enjoyed hockey and tennis though hated netball, which I still can't see the point of.

We did have the coldest, windiest playing fields in the whole of the north of England and my DM thought buying a tracksuit was an extravagance too far, so I just about coped in my aertex shirt and school cardigan. Teachers were always muffled up in thick jackets and trousers etc but were otherwise human.
In the 6th form we could choose a wide range of activities and I did orienteering for a bit then ( subsidised) riding hacks at local stables. State comp in case you're wondering.

One of our games teachers was a former captain and coach of the British Olympic Hockey team so that was another reason tiny, skinny me hated PE and more so when it was outside between January and Easter.

No. I was the smallest and skinniest in my year and never picked to be on a team or partner with anyone. When "dance" (aerobics) came out early 1980s me and my friend would stand at the back muttering "I'm not doing that" and we didn't. Neither of us have been sporty in the 40 years since leaving school.

I LOVED it!!! I did every lunchtime sport and after school sport going. Went to uni and then did no sport at all and still don’t as an adult!! I know I need to do some exercise, I just can’t be bothered.

Fuck no!

Gym knickers, skirts with initials embroidered on and artex t-shirt. For ALL weathers.

"Lapped you, lapped you twice, lapped you 3 times!"

Wheezing to a motivational speech of "faster, you're not even trying." David Goggins is too soft to be a British PE teacher.

The rital humiliation of being the last to be selected onto a team by the bitchy teacher's pets. It used to come to my two untalented friends and A would go first, then B, then you'd see the shoulders go as bitch-face realised she was lumped with me by default.

Not being allowed to play culturally relevant sports like football coz female.

Being moaned at the one time that I had a note because PE clashed with incapacitating period pain which radiated from knees to ribs and rates equivilent to being 5-6cm dilated with a back to back baby.

PE teachers taking 4 years to realise that anyone could genuinely be that inept, slow and uncoordinated. My son is dyspraxic... and far more talented than me!

Always having the flat ball. I was in my 20s before I ever actually played with a fully inflated ball to realise the difference an inflated ball could make.

Always being allocated substitute if possible, or undesirable position like Wing Defense. Never allowed to try positions like Centre.
Once being banned from teaming up with my friends when there was an odd number. I was sent to hit the tennis ball against the wall instead which was totally unfair because the wall completely outclassed me and hit the ball back every time while I went for a tedious trudge to get the bloody thing to try and hit back at it again. What a waste of an hour of life!

Being too short to reach, climb up equipment like the horse or jump over things like hurdles or high jump. My knees were fucked up for years after a fast but thick arsehole decided to set off too early, catch me up and brought me down on the last hurdle. Naturally it was my fault for being slow, not his for strategically catching me to bring me down.

Damp, musty team vests.

Changing around buckets of rainwater from the leaky roof.

In good news the showers and the inspections had been dropped since an older relative had been at the school so that was one less humilation.

The whole thing was a waste of time and revolved entirely around discomfort and humilitation. The only bit of the whole process that could actually be considered exercise was the squirming around to get changed within a t-shirt lest my 30AAs got laughed at.
It was better in y11 when we had some degree of choice and could dump pointless shit like netball. We also had upgraded sports facilities and were the first year group to use the new gym machines which was vastly better as it was more real life and could just do our own thing without demotivating, degrading competition.

Fortunately outside school I did dancing (badly) and that meant that in my 20s I was happy to go to aerobics and yoga classes. I also did DoE and while I failed Bronze because I couldn't think of any sport to do for the physical section, I did go on to learn to swim 25m, and followed up by reaching a ASA silver award for my Gold DoE within 2 years. That gave me the confidence to learn to ride a bike. I then did C25k in my 30s because it fitted around my young family.

A mobile phone taught me how to run. Unlike a PE teacher, the app was kind, motivating and had useful advice like go slower and checking posture. I can wear whatever I'm comfortable with for the weather. I can choose interesting routes. I can set my own goals and build up to them appropriately. I ran a marathon by run/ walking and it was still the same medal that runners got for doing it at double my speed 🤷‍♀️

Although I'm into running and strength work, I'm ruling out Hyrox because those wall-balls look far too much like overweight netballs...
And I still don't do projectiles.

Hated all games and sports at school. I was actually quite good at sport but just hated being shouted at all the time in the cold. All possible joy and fun was removed for no good reason. Schools have a lot to answer for in putting people off sports for life.