Making the unfit kid who comes last run round the field again?

[Veuvelily]

Can anyone tell me the logic here.
What is the games teacher trying to achieve?

The child has tried his best and feels like he’s being punished unfairly
Plus he’s then used up all his energy, so is tired for the actual games lesson

I do feel for your DS and I do hope you get some satisfactory answers from the school.

School PE put me off sport. I was "that" child too. I wasn’t overweight, but I certainly wasn’t athletic and I hated team sports. Our teachers believed in choosing the two sportiest girls in the class and leaving them to select their teams from the rest of us. Along with one other girl, I had the ritual humiliation of always being picked last and the person who ended up with me scowling over it.

Thankfully, I don’t recall any laps of shame on the sports field, but everything else about PE was just horrendous. It still amounted to public humiliation because of the utter obsession with competitive team sports, at which I was useless.

It was sadistic too. I remember us all being made to do hockey and netball in the snow without being able to wear tracksuit tops or bottoms. Just shorts and a t-shirt. Even the sportier ones disliked that. Teacher would be standing by the pitch in her tracksuit and a big outdoor coat.

If your DS was punished for not being one of the faster runners then that is humiliation and needs to be tackled.

Is this one of those PE teachers whose favourite catchphrase is somewhere along the lines of "there’s no such word as can’t?" Mine used to come out with that bullshit.

I was able to give up school PE when I started my O Level options at 13 and it was such a relief. We were actually supposed to do some PE for that couple of years but somehow it never made it onto my timetable and I certainly wasn’t about to draw attention to that. I got away with it. School didn’t notice the error until I was about to go on study leave.

I think you’d be better off helping him get a bit fitter and asking them not to make him do it in a shaming way than defending his current overweight and unfit position.

@5zeds

I think you’d be better off helping him get a bit fitter and asking them not to make him do it in a shaming way than defending his current overweight and unfit position.

I think you would be better off if you actually read OP’s posts.

He isn’t unfit. He is slower at running but does and enjoys football and rugby and uses a punchbag and cycle for an hour each night.

Perhaps the title of the thread is causing this misapprehension? It should possibly be amended but her actual posts are still easy to understand.

Or maybe you are a school PE teacher.

I have seldom run 5k in less than 30 minutes - takes me 20 seconds to run 100m - does that make me unfit? But I did 25k a couple of weeks ago and will be doing a 30k soon.

School sports tend to be biased to those who are natural sprinters - lots of fast twitch muscles - there are plenty of athletic types on MNet who had no idea what their skill was until adulthood - types of school sports are very limited.

OP's son sounds a bit like me a 'mighty glacier'. Rubbish at sprinting but strong and plenty of stamina. Can run and swim forever, just not that fast. But slow is always faster than stop.

@Hellocatshome

Erm this might sound really harsh but the only way you stop being unfit is by exercising more, so running around the field again is actually beneficial to the child's fitness. Obviously has to be done in the right way with the right explanations etc and not done to humiliate the child.

How is the rest of the class watching them huff and puff around the school field by themselves, not going to humiliate them? They're been singled out and shamed.

I actually don’t think 13 stone at 5ft 9 for a 13 year old boy is that bad. He is obviously going to be over 6ft by the time he finishes growing and his weight evens out. He could shoot up 2 or 3 inches in a few weeks. (Dd shot up 6” in 6 weeks)
He is doing a good lot of exercise and I think he is probably quite fit.
He just can’t run.

I think pe lessons need to find the type of sport everyone is capable of
Ds can lift huge weights but can’t run at all. Dd can dance and do the splits but can’t lift weights and isn’t a natural runner but does it occasionally.
I could run but was useless at hockey. We didn’t have running at school. I came to running through a company I worked at in my 20s

Everyone has something they are good at and forcing a child into a humiliating run around a playing field isn’t going to do anything for that child’s long term fitness

How is the rest of the class watching them huff and puff around the school field by themselves, not going to humiliate them? nowhere did the OP say the rest of the class watched.

I actually don’t think 13 stone at 5ft 9 for a 13 year old boy is that bad

It's 99th BMI centile on the child scale, where overweight begins at 90th, and very overweight at 97th.

(For an adult, it would also be overweight)

I'm not saying I agree but 13 stone @ 5ft 9 and aged 13, is considered highly overweight on NHS website.

I actually don’t think 13 stone at 5ft 9 for a 13 year old boy is that bad and this is why we have an obesity problem, my just turned 14 DS is 9st 6 and 5ft 11, if je was 13 he would quite clearly be overweight. My DH is 6ft and 13stone and would only have to gain 3 more pounds to be classed as overweight.

Sorry thats meant to say if he were 13 stone he would clearly be overweight

If the child is overweight and unfit then getting them to do more excercise is ok in my book. Not in a power trip way but explaining to child they are unfit and more excercise will help them become fitter. Seriously if a child can't run around a field without exhaustion they do need more excercise to pull fitness levels up.

Being publicly humiliated is NOT motivating .
Trust me, my P E teacher regularly took pleasure in humiliating me and it put me off exercise for life!

It's just completely the wrong approach, isn't it? The whole point of the lesson should be to encourage people to exercise, get fit and enjoy exercise. This isn't going to accomplish that and I don't think singling out one person on their own is a good idea anyway.

However, I don't think they should get rid of the competitive element of sports - they should just provide more options. For kids who don't like traditional academic subjects sport and PE can be the only thing they look forward to. Other subjects have competitive aspects (exams) so I don't think PE shouldn't, but I think it should be tempered with the option of non-competitive activities.

TBH I think they should be promoting walking as you're way less likely to get injured and it's way more accesible as well. You don't really need to get changed and can fit it in more easily (like a 10, 15 min walk in the evening) and are more likely to get other people to come with you.

It would be good if they offered hiking/walking loops and different routes as part of PE (not for all of PE, just for some of it).

@caringcarer

If the child is overweight and unfit then getting them to do more excercise is ok in my book. Not in a power trip way but explaining to child they are unfit and more excercise will help them become fitter. Seriously if a child can't run around a field without exhaustion they do need more excercise to pull fitness levels up.

Such an ablest attitude. There may be various reasons why someone can't run around the field and judging and humiliating them is just bullying.

He’s not 13 stone, where did that come from?!
He’s less than 12 stone
I don’t want to make a big deal about getting on the scales. He was 11.10 at Easter after he gave up everything for Lent.
Which is fine for an adult, but overweight for a child

With issues such as dyslexia, ADHD and possible PDA, does he have an EHCP? Not that it should matter, the PE teacher should afford your son some courtesy and kindness, but reasonable adjustments could be arranged, to ensure that this definitely does not continue to happen, and that his dignity is preserved.
Poor boy, sending him and you a hug.

The thing I always find odd is that for most subjects, teachers need to be able to manage a spectrum of ability. It was one of the reasons I didn’t go into teaching- I suspected I’d enjoy teaching the clever kids but not the lower ability ones which I think would have made me ill suited to teaching.

For PE though, too many teachers get away with being shit at teaching those of a lower ability. It shouldn’t just be about the A team but I’d say a true test of ability is whether a teacher can inspire those who are reluctant to improve abs enjoy sport. Adopting humiliation tactics says more about the teacher than it does about the OP’s son.

@Hellocatshome

How is the rest of the class watching them huff and puff around the school field by themselves, not going to humiliate them? nowhere did the OP say the rest of the class watched.

I would assume that during a PE lesson the class are there, in the field where they have just run around the field. They can see this child, who has been singled out, having to run around again.

I would assume that during a PE lesson the class are there, in the field where they have just run around the field. They can see this child, who has been singled out, having to run around again.

Thats just an assumption though. DSs class run around the field as a warm up to whatever else it is they are doing in PE so after they have ran around they would go in to use the gym, or get organised into a game of football etc so for all we know no-one was stood around gawping at the child running an extra lap.

Doesn't this depend on what the circumstances were..... was the child not trying and just walking/talking all the way round? If they were then I think it's fair enough (they wouldn't get away with this in a maths lesson) but if the child was really trying then this is not on.

I'm amazed that anyone is still defending this.

Of course the answer to a lack of fitness is to build stamina through doing more exercise but PE classes in front of a group of peers are hardly the place to single unfit children out. It's just ineffective, for starters - the average PE lesson is not long enough to make a difference to kids' fitness so the best the staff can hope to do is kindle children's enthusiasm and build self-esteem so children are encouraged to exercise out of class.

What did this teacher do? Damaged this poor boy's self-esteem and made him associate exercise negatively with failure and humiliation rather than positively with achievement and feeling good. Nul points.

@Hellocatshome

I would assume that during a PE lesson the class are there, in the field where they have just run around the field. They can see this child, who has been singled out, having to run around again.

Thats just an assumption though. DSs class run around the field as a warm up to whatever else it is they are doing in PE so after they have ran around they would go in to use the gym, or get organised into a game of football etc so for all we know no-one was stood around gawping at the child running an extra lap.

You're also making an assumption. It doesn't really matter if the whole city were watching via Zoom or if they were were wearing eye masks and told not to look. One child was singled out from all the others and he's singled out every single PE class which is humiliating for him.

At school, we would run around to warm up and then get on with whatever we were on the field for. There may also be other children doing sports on the field. The field was also overlooked by classrooms so other children would be able to watch you run around by yourself on the field while they got on with lessons.

Neither of use know the layout of the school or field and I don't understand your pedantry here. What are you trying to say? That because he may not have been overlooked or seen by other pupils, that it wasn't humiliating for him?

They’re all out in a field together so the rest of the class would have been there. Not sure if they started the activity before him or waited for him.

Here’s how ds sees it...
“John can do the lap really easily so doesn’t have to try hard at all. It’s harder for me, I have to try really hard to get it done, and then I have to do it again because I’m too slow. How is that fair?”