'Schools should have twirly, girly, fitness for girls' (?!!!?!!)

[Berts]

As in, on the news this morning, 'Schools are being encouraged to introduce Zumba, or dance, to encourage girls to participate'.

So depressing. I was not a sporty kid, always last to be picked for any team and no hand-eye coordination at all. I only discovered competitive sports at the age of 30, and it's been brilliant! I love it! I love competing and being super-fit!

I wish I'd realised I loved competitive sport years ago, so what went wrong at school?

I suspect it's a combination of (a) sports teachers who are only interested in naturally sporty, talented kids and don't take time to help the weedy less apt to get better; (b) lack of choice (netball all winter, rounders all summer, er, that was it); and (c) girls feeling it's not okay to be sweaty and knackered after a good training session.

Any thoughts?

If it gets them moving and they like doing it I don't care whether they do hockey or zumba, cross country running or trampolining, as long as its offered to everyone.

I personally would have loved a dance class rather than running.

As long as other sports are still offered alongside the dance and the dance sessions open to all (not just aimed at girls) then no problem imo.

sounds a good idea. I hate sport
but might have enjoyed something that it wasn't obvious I was crap at.
I assume boys will be allowed to do it if they want

For me it was as you say PE teachers only interested in naturally sporty girls. PE teacher being quite nasty to non sporty girls. PE caused me injuries. PE teacher staring at us when we were changing and in the showers . I was told by a guy I went to school with years later that the Male PE teacher well, the guy I went to school with was under 16 at the time.

ds's school already offer zumba and dancing at PE, it's mixed as are the other activities - the boys that choose it are in the minority but a significant one. Around the same number of girls choose rugby and football, and athletics and trampolining are about 50/50.

Two of my girls would have hated this idea. (As would I back in the Dark Ages.)

Fine to offer it as an option for everyone, as Pascha says, but why target girls?

The reason for targeting girls is that there's a substantial body of evidence confirming what the new study says: that girls' participation in physical activity drops off dramatically when they get to secondary school age. Many many schools still offer a narrow range of physical activities; broadening them is one way of getting more girls involved. If you look at stats for adult women's physical activity, far more of them are doing stuff like zumba than playing netball.

The long-term consequences for women's health of this inactivity are negative. So it makes good sense both for the individuals and for society to get girls moving!

No reason not to change the perception of and attitudes to team sports at the same time, of course - the two don't have to be mutually exclusive.

Dance is already a part of the PE National Curriculum - for boys and girls. Lots of boys hate PE as well - possibly even more than girls later on, as there is more pressure on boys to be good at football etc. These kinds of 'initiatives' always cause eye-rolling on my part.

I teach Zumba as part of PE at our secondary school. We also offer things such as Body Combat, Spinning, and Aerobics - all running alongside 'traditional' sports such as football, netball, athletics, dodgeball, badminton and basketball.

At our school, it works.

That's for both boys, and girls, I should clarify.

campergirls - 'girls' participation in physical activity drops off dramatically when they get to secondary school age'

Do you mean participation outside of PE?

Body Combat sounds cool.

I think it's a really good idea to introduce more non-competitive activities in PE. As an adult I do lots of exercise and activity, and I'll go to fitness classes (yoga, aerobics) but never competitive sports.

But I agree about targeting girls with this, I loathe dance far more than competitive sports, the worst bit of PE for me was the dire "contemporary dance".

and my dds similarly all hate dance. They like judo, kayaking, cycling.

But having lots of options, competitive and non-competitive, open to both boys and girls, that seems a good idea in terms of long term fitness habits.

I loathed PE at school and it wouldn't matter which team games were introduced and how. I hate them and always have-I can't even stand watching them.
More choice for all would be a good idea. I was never going to be able to throw a javelin- so no point in wasting time making me do it.
The first breakthrough for PE teachers would be to understand that many pupils don't like it- they are all under the impression they are a fun subject.

We did "dance" as one of our modules in PE, this was in the 80s. So not exactly a new idea.

It was quite enjoyable, was like aerobics really.

It's a good idea if it gets people moving and is available to all.

They do Zumba as an extra curric at my dds senior school. But not as a main pe lesson - which are hockey, netball, cross country, athletics, swimming and tennis.

I think we did contemporary dance at school. it was rubbish, I hated it. The girls do a bit but its not really their thing.

Can't bear all these wet girls that hate PE!

The first breakthrough for PE teachers would be to understand that many pupils don't like it- they are all under the impression they are a fun subject.

Too true!

God, I'd hate my girls to have a PE teacher who assumed everyone was negative about it!

Like having a maths teacher who assumes everyone hates maths!

Has the report taken any account of girls embarrassment/difficulties when periods start?

Mine started in year 7 & we were still doing mixed PE with boys, cue much self-consciousness when wearing leotards & unable to go swimming as I hasn't started using tampons.

I also had a lot of trouble with period pains & spent many hours on the bed in the nurses room not wanting to do PE or indeed anything. Surely others had a similar experience?

Later on we did aerobics & gym sessions at the local leisure centre which was much better suited to me.

We had to do dance at school while the boys got rugby.

I hated PE at school (last to be picked, etc, etc) but I love rugby and went on to play at University. I've always been a bit resentful that I wasn't allowed to play the only sport I was quite good at, at school, just because I was a girl.

Mind you, I also liked cross-country running which we got for about a week a year - I wish they'd had orienteering or something like that (which I also did at University).

OH my god, periods aren't the end of the world! My daughter is at a girls only school - no leotards anyway and you can miss swimming if you want (although they all seem to use tampons). It is totally not an issue, thank goodness.

And exercise is the absoulute best thing for period pains as the teachers seem to realise very well.

Yes, our pe teacher would have no truck with the period pains excuse (unless you had a note), and to be fair to her she was right - exercise was great for my horrendous period pains when I was 14/15.

Luckily this was in the 1980s when v long sweatshirts were common so I could get away with ultra pad/tampon combo.

I think there is a distinction to be made between low grade aches during a period and the intense pain of dysmenorrhoea. Exercise helps the former but not the latter, and the latter also often comes with menorrhagia (very heavy loss and flooding).