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Exercise

Chat to other fitness enthusiasts on our Exercise forum.

Did you enjoy PE at school?

145 replies

BeRubyReader · 02/04/2025 16:09

No

OP posts:
JustGotToKeepOnKeepingOn · 02/04/2025 18:47

Hated it. For some unknown reason we didn’t do netball or hockey, etc at primary school so when I got to secondary school I had no idea how to play anything. I was constantly yelled at for getting it wrong and never learned the rules.

Unsurprisingly it put me off for life. I still have no idea how the scoring for tennis works. And have zero interest in finding out.

The changing rooms were also horrific. Having to have showers in front of peers with a dragon of a PE teacher standing over us keeping note of who had their period… just vile.

TwoWildlings · 02/04/2025 18:49

I liked it in primary school - especially when the old school gym equipment would come out. You knew it was going to be a fun lesson.

Secondary school - it was mostly good. I loved or netball and rounders but hated hockey. Especially when we had to play during a freezing winters day.

MissGeist · 02/04/2025 18:53

Secondary school, NO! I refused to do it after year 8.
Bullying in the changing rooms as I am quite hairy, being picked last for everything and being ignored in stupid games like netball.

These days you can't stop me running or going to the gym. I can even beat the speedy girls who used to beat me at running. I've just hung in there for 36yrs 😁.

wastingtimeonhere · 02/04/2025 18:54

I loved P.E. but was shit at it. One of the last to be chosen in team games. The only sport I knew I was good at was football. Girls were not allowed to play it. I still remember a male teacher, when I asked if we could have a girls team, laughing, saying 'girls DO NOT play football, go away'. Went to state junior/ middle/ comp.

My own kids..
DS1 was very sporty, Still can play most sports and run but doesn't have the lifestyle to commit to teams. Prep school, senior indie.
DS2, no coordination, hated school sports but joined judo at senior school as an extracurricular. He liked hiking trips too. state primary, indie senior.
DD no real sports until senior school, switched to indie and found she was massively behind the girls who had gone to preps.Did martial arts out of school to national level. School only interested in those at country/ county level in school sports. state primary, senior indie.
I found primary schools didn't really do or teach sports, but vague 'games' The prep was very traditional prep sports and actually taught the sports. Senior Indie focused on the kids already doing sports, not bothering to 'teach' the kids who hadn't already learnt.

ViciousCurrentBun · 02/04/2025 18:54

Loved it and was in the hockey and cross country teams. In the big inter school cross country championships I would place pretty much in the middle so I wasn’t some sort of sports star. Hated netball though as it’s so boring. Lots of the girls hated getting sweaty and cared about how they looked. I was to be fair an absolute tomboy though and thought nothing of swimming in the sea in my knickers and vest as we grew up at the beach because I fancied it, had many a hiding for that. We didn’t have a shower at my house and only a bath, this was the very late 1970’s and 1980’s so I loved the opportunity for a shower.

Grandfather was a PT instructor in the army, Mother was a professional dancer and circus performer when young, DH parents were Captains of hockey teams and played till about 30 as did DH, they were all keen sailors as well inc SIL. DS was good at every sport he tried and captain of his cricket team, still playing football as an adult. DD wasn’t sporty but was an accomplished pianist.

StrictlyAFemaleFemale · 02/04/2025 18:54

Yes except for fitness (boring) and badminton (shit tennis).

wastingtimeonhere · 02/04/2025 18:55

and now in my late 50s I play 1 team sport, 1 martial arts and cycle.

Relaxd · 02/04/2025 18:57

I liked it but definitely aspects I didn’t (communal showers, the odd bossy teacher, gym skirts). I was quite fast so got to represent my house occasionally and I escaped some of the embarrassment of never being picked for teams despite not being particularly popular otherwise. I did a few sports outside of school and that was much more fun, with coaching and competitions. At primary school, sports day was my favourite day of the year, probably because we won sweets back then.

Tortielady · 02/04/2025 19:03

Scene: a large, municipal park in the mid 70s.
Me trundling along a running route as slowly as I could get away with.
PE teacher: get a move on Tortie! Weirdoes hang around this park, looking for little girls like you!

Lovely. And it just about sums up the misery of PE and games at that school. When I moved, the misery came with me, because I loathed PE and games, but I did better academically and my new school was into dance and drama and I enjoyed both, so it took the edge off. I'm 60 now and still averse to physical effort. I go to the gym to keep my joints as supple as possible and I walk as much as I can. I'm absolutely convinced of the importance of physical activity regardless of age, size and health status and constantly flummoxed by how much energy goes into putting us off it.

Meadowfinch · 02/04/2025 19:03

PenneyFouryourthoughts · 02/04/2025 18:25

Hated it. Hate team sports. I’d rather exercise alone, or go for a walk/hike. Female PE teachers were sadists.

I agree with sadism being an essential part of being a PE teacher.

I remember ours, warmly wrapped up in a thick track suit and wooly hat, forcing us out onto the hockey field in horizontal sleet in aertex shirts and tiny hockey skirts.

How is anyone supposed to enjoy blue thighs, rampant period pain and frost bite in the fingers? Even now 40 years later, I regard the hateful woman with loathing. She achieved nothing positive although her bullying clearly gave her a kick.

What other job allows grown adults to abuse children with impunity?

tsmainsqueeze · 02/04/2025 19:08

Sulu17 · 02/04/2025 17:12

No. I remember being forced to do athletics during a heavy period, and being shouted at nastily by the teacher when I stopped because blood was running down my legs.

This is truly horrific ,what kind of person would behave like that ! i hope your parents sorted them out !
To many experiences like this alongside barbaric communal showers for teenagers who generally just want to be hiding under a rock at that age with lunatic bitch teachers made pe in the 80's a total nightmare.
I quite liked it at primary ,absolutely bloody hated it at secondary , i was very talented at writing letters from 'parents' for myself and others to get out of it, never got sussed.
Everybody bar about 2 girls in my year hated it ,total failure on the schools part,its sad looking back how different things could have been with some encouragement and kindness, i hope all those evil hated female pe teachers live with some regret at their nastiness .

AlmostCutMyHairToday · 02/04/2025 19:21

No. It sucked all the joy out of sports and made it a chore.

CTR1000 · 02/04/2025 19:22

Loved it, other than cross country running 😂

averylongtimeago · 02/04/2025 19:27

I left school after 6th form age 18 In 1977.
I loathed PE, the sadistic teachers, the bullying, being either freezing cold or boiling hot, the dreadful emphasis on vile team games, and the humiliation of the communal showers.
Hockey in gym knickers and airtex shirt, below freezing and sleeting while “Miss” was wrapped up like an arctic explorer. Summer wasn’t any better. I can’t run now and I couldn’t then. Being shrieked at and called names wasn’t going to help.
It was the same for my DH, only it was football and athletics for him. His PE teacher broke his arm by deliberately kicking a (heavy wet) leather football at him, then made him carry on playing.

Why oh why can’t PE be about having fun keeping fit- airobics, Zumba, yoga, whatever with after school clubs for the ones who show talent/ want to play proper sports? Perhaps the the non-sporty majority might actually enjoy exercise and the overall health of e
would be better.

But no, that would mean PE teachers actually having to do some work.

DataColour · 02/04/2025 19:31

I loved PE, my favourite subject at school. Just loved playing sports on general. I went to an all girls school and everybody seemed to have asimilar positive experience.
My dad was sporty and encouraged me and both my teenagers are sporty too doing it for GCSE too. I still like exercising.

Buttonknot · 02/04/2025 19:32

Yes, especially netball.

abracadabra1980 · 02/04/2025 19:35

No-hated it. Still hate all forms of exercise unless it involves a horse or a dog.

Ponderingwindow · 02/04/2025 19:40

You mean the class that is supposed to be about public health and teaching children to find a way to be fit for life? The one that is supposed to help children find their path to physical activity that they can sustain for a lifetime?

the class that instead tells every non-sporty child that they are incompetent and deserve to be publicly bullied by classmates and teachers? The class that could teach a variety of fitness options that would appeal to a variety of skill sets and personality types but instead focuses on team sports and natural athletic ability?

no, I didn’t like that class

nocoolnamesleft · 02/04/2025 19:41

You call it PE, I call it ritualised humiliation. No, I didn't enjoy it. Totally alienated me from physical activity.

TheOliveFinch · 02/04/2025 21:06

Hated it apart from swimming or occasional trampolining. Did play hockey for the school although I hated that too. Love exercise now but don’t fo any team or racquet sports

Gnomegarden32 · 02/04/2025 21:50

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.

BogRollBOGOF · 02/04/2025 22:40

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.

Coali · 02/04/2025 22:45

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.

TroysMammy · 02/04/2025 22:46

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.

TroysMammy · 02/04/2025 22:52

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.

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