Did you enjoy PE at school?

[BeRubyReader]

No

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.

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.

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

"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.

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

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.

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.

"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.

Loathed it. Did Latin to get out of it

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

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.

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?

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.

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

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

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!

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.

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.

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.

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

PE is differentiated in my DCs school. Just 2 sets, the more confident and the less confident apparently.

Reading about the showering business has reminded me of a loud comment made by the PE teacher while forcing us to shower 'some of you obviously haven't showered lately and you need it'. What a bloody cheek! How dare she?? 14 year old me took great care in my personal hygiene and appearance, as did most others from what I could see. And even if some were lacking, I wouldn't think it's a good idea to announce it to the room.

No, it was horrendous. Ours was a sporty school too, lots of hockey and tennis, cross country etc. We had a small pool with annual galas and the odd canoe lesson. The only sports lessons that were OK were trampolining and rounders. I didn't mind Netball too much.

No I hated it. And nothing will convince me that most PE teachers aren’t sadistic arseholes.

Yes, I did. But at my school you were allowed to sign up to the sport you wanted to do. So I only had to do dance or hockey in the first year of secondary school. I loved netball, bench all, rounders but could be remembering through rose to red spectacles. I know I liked the change from being sat in a classroom concentrating to being outside or running around.