4/29/2023 0 Comments The unbeatable game cut the ropeThey know it’s how to get the best productivity out of them.”Ī 2014 study found that 6-year-olds who engage more in unstructured play are better decision-makers, and more capable of social relationships. “Think about those high-tech companies, like Google, and how they provide their employees with opportunities for play. “If we’re really walking the talk about 21 st century skills, creativity is one of them, and it goes hand-in-hand with play,” says Drain. In fact, one study found that six-year-olds who engage more in unstructured play are better decision-makers, and more capable of social relationships. “They need to be able to make up their own rules, to learn to get along with each other, to solve problems-and they don’t do that at an organized soccer practice,” points out Drain. What happens on the playground as kids negotiate games and navigate their world gets to the heart of social and emotional learning (SEL), another casualty of the NCLB era. Rogers, called play “the work of childhood.” What Seattle parents and educators understood intuitively is this: Play is not a break from learning. “The one question that got everybody was, ‘Do you think your students get enough unstructured time in the day?’ And everybody said no.” The Value of Playtime But when the union surveyed its members in 2015, as a precursor to contract negotiations, they found equal concern among Seattle educators. They were the real catalysts, first engaging with individual schools,” Tamayo says. “Parents started the conversation, via social media, about equity in recess. While the more privileged group would get upwards of 45 minutes of recess a day, poorer, Black students typically had no more than 15, and sometimes none. In fact, a 2014 National Public Radio investigation of recess in Seattle found stark divisions between wealthier, predominantly White schools and those serving more students of color and more low-income families. Making matters worse in Seattle, where there was no district policy on recess, whether students got a healthy break in their day often depended on whether they went to school in a wealthy community, notes Michael Tamayo, a fourth- and fifth-grade teacher and a member of the Seattle Education Association bargaining team. Generally, middle and high schools have even less. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. elementary schools had no daily recess, according to the U.S. (Their mandatory-recess bill passed almost unanimously in the Florida House, but stalled in the state Senate.) Overall, in 2014, about two out of 10 U.S. In Florida this year, parents complained to state legislators that some schools had zero. (To find out how you can get involved in those conversations in your community, visit Get ESSA Right.)Īt Brooks’ school, the younger kids get three recesses a day, while the older ones get two. It’s not one who sits and takes tests all day,” says Collin Brooks, a National Board certified physical education teacher from Bend, Ore., and the president of Oregon SHAPE. With the passage of the new Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and its welcome focus on local-and state-designed standards, “it’s a great time to spark conversations around what a well-rounded child looks like. “I would call it a crime, actually, to deny physical activity to kids…. Recess has cognitive, emotional, social benefits, and lots of research to support it,” says Terri Drain, a National Board certified physical education teacher in Alameda County, Calif., and a member of the Society of Health and Physical Educators (SHAPE) board of directors. “It’s been alarming to see the way that No Child led to less recess. Recess supporters point to the health benefits of exercise and movement, the way that physical activity supports cognitive development, plus the critical social and emotional learning that takes place when children have unstructured, free time to play. ![]() Meanwhile, one Texas school has jacked up its daily allotment of recess to four times a day. In recent years, mandatory-recess legislation has been introduced in at least four states, including Florida, Illinois, New Jersey, and Rhode Island. It’s time, they say, for the school day to return to a healthier state of play. Similar efforts are taking place across the U.S., as educators and parents take note of how the No Child Left Behind (NCLB)-era of high-stakes, high-stress testing altered their children’s school day, lengthening the hours that students stay in their seats and squeezing the minutes they swing across playgrounds. Last year in Seattle public schools, low-income kids won an equal right to play, thanks to a fierce coalition of Seattle teachers and parents who set up an unbeatable campaign to bring recess back to the school day.
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