How could PE be improved in schools?

[chris1987]

I'm studying to be a PE teacher and would really like to know your thoughts on how PE could be improved :)

Understand just how self conscious teenagers can be about their bodies. As someone who developed big boobs at an early age, the changing rooms made me sick with fear. Other girls wrestling with me to try to read the size label in the back of my bra so that they could all laugh at it did not encourage me. I spent all seven years at secondary trying to run with my arms folded because I was so uncomfortable, physically and mentally. (Sports bras were ironically only made in small sizes until about 15 years ago, so there was no hope of getting one of those).

Also understand that just shouting at someone to run faster when they are already running as fast as they can does not actually help. Nor does detention for not being able to run at a certain speed. I was not overweight or particularly unfit, and as an adult I can run long distances. But what I can't do is sprint. Because my muscles just won't do it, no matter what my brain tells them.

My very sporty, very slim, very fit daughter is in her first year at secondary school and has already been put off PE by bad teaching.

I’m another one who was completely put off all sport and exercise by PE.

We didn’t have much variety, we played a lot of badminton and rounders and as I have rubbish had eye coordination and could never hit the ball I would just stand there feeling useless for the whole lesson, ignored by the teachers while they worked with the sporty kids. When we did have variety we weren’t taught the rules well so we’d play basketball without really getting it.

Cross country and the bleep test were humiliating, we’d never built up to running so I just couldn’t do it. Nobody would expect an adult to go running for an hour without learning how to first.

As I wasn’t very good at anything I’d be singled out and put together with other low ability children publicly which was embarrassing and meant I was never with my friends. I still think this was completely unnecessary.

When we did trampolining children would laugh at the larger children and look underneath to see how close it would get to the floor, the teacher never stopped this.

I did enjoy hockey the one time we played it, and the few lessons we spent building human pyramids- that was something we could all join in with.

In my late 20s I took up a team sport and loved it. They were so encouraging, telling me to only compare myself with me to see how far I’d come, getting people to do things they weren’t as good at so they could all learn and it made me want to do other exercise to be stronger for my sport. I also met inspiring athletic women who were all different shapes and sizes. It was a revelation and made me feel really angry about the way PE was taught.

Reading this thread I realise how brilliant the sports teachers at my DCs school are.

The thing I found a bit annoying was that they don't enforce the PE uniform - they let, within reason, kids wear what they are comfortable in. I think this has been helpful, especially for girls who are self conscious of their bodies.

.. Making PE optional is simply not ethical.

You're right about that but allowing the shitty practises detailed in this thread is also not ethical. PE in its current form is doing absolutely nothing to help the obesity crisis. Often all it does is make slightly larger/unfitter kids miserable so that they think they hate all exercise and stop all together as soon as they can.
The system needs an overhaul.

get rid of skorts, shorts and short skirts for girls. Bad enough having your body on show and then maybe having to deal with a period.

Split by ability for PE / sport rather than just age, I mean the whole school year as they do with maths and MFL.

Allow kids to substitute sport outside school for PE lessons. I hated PE but outside school I was doing Karate, Ju-Jitsu and swimming.

Have lessons where the individual can improve fitness eg aerobics or dance.

Don't assume the fat kid is unfit.

Don't pick captains and then allow them to pick the team.

Devise games where everyone in a team / group can take part and the group cannot win without everyone doing something, preferably something the less sporty can do WELL, eg an obstacle course where half the team have to go over an obstacle and half under but which is actually designed for a wheelchair user to get under faster than the sporty ultra fit child.

Everyone loves a game of rounders. Just a thought.

Yeah standing there swinging a bat that misses each time then been sent to stand as far away as possible so the only time a ball comes near you is when it is really important but no matter how hard you try you cannot catch it.

Yep that ritual humiliation is fantastic for teenage girls.

NEVER let captains pick their teams. It is excruciating to be the last one picked because you are unpopular, fat, not great at sport etc. It is never about ability but popularity as to who gets picked first.

Don't just teach rules; teach tactics and strategy. Watch how those less able play and give them tips on how they can improve their game but in a supportive way.

Let the kids pick what they do. I hated hockey and netball but loved the trampoline but it came out twice a year and the lesson consisted of each of us taking a turn while the whole class looked on

Don't favour those who love sports and therefore love your lessons. Really puts other pupils off especially if they don't like sport in the first place. It was so bleeding obvious who our PE teachers favourites were. Maybe if she has taken an interest in those less able and was more supportive of those people we would not have hated PE so much.

Make sure kids have privacy to shower and change. We used to be forced to take off our towels and shower altogether

Everyone loves a game of rounders.

No we don't. That was the ultimate 'we can't be arsed game' where you spend more time sitting on your butt than doing anything active if you aren't co-ordinated enough to hit a ball with a bat.

I REALLY rock my 'sitting on my butt watching other people exercise' GAINS!

On the plus side I learnt how to do daisy chains during rounders. It was one of the decisive moments why I left Scouts (there were numerous other reasons) in that we had to play rounders at school, WHY THE HELL WHERE WE DOING IT WHEN WE ARE SUPPOSED TO BE DOING SOMETHING FUN!

Ban other children picking teams. I was always last, it was horrendous.

Not forcing children to keep going when they are wheezing and struggling

Set activities to cater for all abilities

Separate changing cubicles

Some excellent suggestions here. My daughter hates PE but will happily climb anything...trees, climbing walls, and likes scrambling over hills and mountains. She's at her happiest taking her grandad's dog for long walks. She also loves cycling, swimming and pushing a scooter. School only has swimming as an option, and only for six weeks in summer. I agree, get the kids fit first, before pushing them into sports and activities they are either not fit enough for, or are not suited to.

My daughter hates team sports. She also has to do The Mile Run every Thursday morning without fail, which is a source of resentment. Her friend wasn't very well one Thursday morning so they walked round together, and we noticed that our daughter was de-merited as a result. Kindness means squat in that PE department.

DD's secondary school PE uniform is so much more sensible than what I was forced to wear in 1990...I had a polo neck cotton t-shirt, gym knickers and a gym skirt. The boys used to pull up our skirts as a laugh. My daughter wears school logoed tracksuit bottoms or shorts, a school logoed t-shirt, and a school logoed hoodie. A lot more expensive to buy, but at least, no humiliation. We had communal showers: hideous. My daughter's school has individual cubicles, with hot water!

I think if a child isn't good at the prescribed activities on offer it doesn't make them any less active. I regularly got poor results for PE but I can walk for miles and miles. My daughter is the same. If PE had a rambling option, she'd be brilliant at it.

I was always so bloody cold and they would only let us wear shorts, and it had to be icy to be allowed a jumper 🤨 by going in feeling uncomfortable, I hated it. Only developing a relationship with fitness now

Not so competitive - room for the "happy crappies" as my particular group of non-sporty friends used to call ourselves. We used to have a right laugh left to our own devices whilst playing badminton. We were all rubbish; couldn't hit the shuttlecock to save our lives BUT got fit by running collect the shuttlecock from wherever it had ended up (usually the flowerbeds).

Our DS sounds very much like your DD, Waterloo. He did his pe homework on climbing the other day, he really doesn't enjoy mainstream team sports but would stun them if they hired a climbing wall.

Everyone loves a game of rounders.

This is part of the problem, really - the inability to see why some people might not like a game like rounders and what makes it difficult for them.

Rounders is fun when it's you and a handful of mates. I remember school rounders had teams so big you did bugger all most of the time.

I'd encourage really sitting and thinking "imagine I am someone with painful joints and rubbish fitness - what wouldn't I hate?"

As a fat nerdy kid where running was and still is painful, all the old default sports were equally hateful. Swimming was ok, an 8-week one-off set of lessons at the local gym where I got to use the rowing machine was great. Line-dancing/country dancing I love (no running and clear instructions, yes please), and currently doing Longsword as a hobby, want to pursue Archery at some point.

"General fitness" should not HAVE to be based around running and high flexibility, because some of us really can't without pain.

Decent choices from a mix of individual and team; no compulsion to to play rugby; the opportunity to learn to swim properly; kids not picking teams; decent balance of competitive and participation; assessment of kids abilities and plans for individual progress to take priority over team formation.

Certainly more swimming provision at secondary level. I had 0 swimming provision at secondary school despite being two council owned pools nearby

Physical Education should mean just that. Not just an hour when the unfit kids feel completely and utterly humiliated.

Do kids still do foof tech? Maybe getting a project going between the two to show how physical activities and food intertwine to make a person healthy.

Each person to set a goal, what they want to achieve. And make it fun.

Food not foof

Foof tech

Our school (who do very little setting) do set for PE after half a term, this helps quite a bit I think.
More explanation of how to actually do quite basic things rather than assuming kids know.
Stop constantly shouting at them to get changed quicker!

I would ditch PE. The PE that I remember was a ritual of torture and humiliation. Why would you want your DC to go through the the same hell that you suffered? Ditch team sports, showers, skimpy kit, shouty teachers. Encourage students to be more active during the day. Encourage healthy eating. Show students how to make delicious food using simple ingredients. Walking, dancing and aerobics would be a start.

When he started at secondary in year 7, my DS didn't want to play rugby (compulsory, no choice!), so he deliberately made himself useless - he'd run slowly, be generally clumsy, etc so that the teacher would put him in the bottom group. It shouldn't have to be that way! In reality, he's really fit and healthy, goes jogging, swimming, cycling and plays football. He just didn't want to play a rough sport like Rugby. The teacher didn't help by telling them in their first ever lesson they'd need mouth/teeth guards to avoid losing a tooth and to toughen themselves up because they would get hurt a lot! (Nice bloke!). What a way to encourage sport (not!).

When I was at school I disliked most about PE lessons was the fear of being the last one picked for any team game, but then I was pretty good at most of the sports so it didn’t happen. I did feel sorry for those kids who were the last and made to feel inferior. The PE kit was a bit grim too. Pleated skirts and tshirts in all weathers. Track suits would have been much better.
I was also lucky that my school didn’t only concentrate on team games We also did orienteering, dance, tennis, swimming and ten pin bowling.

My kids have all had different standards of sporting ability and 30 years later they have attended the same secondary school which has moved on with the times and expanded the choice of activities even more, so there has been something to suit all of them. I think it’s great that a lot of schools are encouraging just walking so all abilities are able to get some form of exercise and fresh air at their own level, and some even include the parents. There’s too much childhood obesity nowadays and just sitting indoors playing computer games doesn’t help at all.