I'm completing my observations at a school that serves grades k-5. The class that I'm observing is a 1st grade classroom. The school had many support staff. It has a principal and an assistant principal. I had the opportunity to further interview with the assistant principal. She is a female and has taught in the classroom prior. She was very insightful to me as teacher and parent. She did communicate to me that even though she works in the city, she lives in the rural area of our town. She stated she has a daughter who is a 9th grader this year and she is overweight. She explained to me that she sees a lot of struggles in her daughter that she sees in the students at her school as it relates to obesity. She did explain to me that her child attends a school in a rural area and there was little to no consideration in her daughter's program that focused on preventing childhood obesity. Ms. Brown stated the curriculum for her daughter only involved one semester of physical education and the other was a theory based health class. She stated she was not very please with this lack of concern for health and obesity at the high school level and it only forced her to look at the programs they had in place at her school on the elementary level.
I now have a better understanding of why people tend to advocate for a cause, it is normally something that affects or has affected them. I feel you have to be passionate about a cause to advocate for it, it has to be in your heart to make a difference. Many people will start an advocacy cause then later stop fighting for it. I feel this is in part to the fact , that the cause was not a part of their heart. It has to be something you can not let go of in your mind. I feel this way about teaching and educating children. This is something I can't let go of. I know right now many professionals in the field of education or rethinking or second guessing their chosen fields, but I am an advocate not only for childhood obesity, but education as well. I feel all children deserve to be properly educated and cared for in and out of the school setting.
I had the privilege to observe the end of the year field day at this school. I felt this would be an opportunity to see all of the fun physical activities and challenges I remember seeing when I was a child during field. I found none of that was the case. Many of the professionals were walking around the campus in their themed t-shirts in a volunteer capacity, but I did not see many physical activities. This is a neighborhood school. They seemed to be focused on the number of parents and outside officials they could have at their school for the sake of the day, instead of offering more physical activities for the children. They did have a bouncer, but I noticed many of the students that were older did not jump in it. I also saw an area where a disc jockey was stationed and the children were allowed to dance to current music. I'm unsure if the children were even aware they were exercising, or the benefits of dancing as a physical activity.
I did ask the office staff clerk, whom I saw was very instrumental in organizing the event, if the children were going to do relay races or other physical activities. She stated because the weather was inclement, they had to move a lot of the activities inside in the event it started to rain. I feel they should have been more prepared to make field day more physical, regardless if it rained or not. They should have had a rain date, to ensure physical activities would be able to take place. No administrative personnel seemed to be the slightest concerned that field day appeared to turn into a carnival in my opinion. I saw more food items being served and sold, than children being engaged in physical activities. I find this is the same with families and children. Parents are comfortable with children watching video games or some other indoor activity than going outside and getting physical exercise. Most parents do not want to go outside with their children and supervise them, just as most schools do not want to do the same. Most of this is normally left to the physical education teacher in schools and a few teacher and parent volunteers. I feel everyone needs to advocate for more physical activity in and outside of the classroom.
Finally - I was able to open this. I think this is your Blog 2 discussion vs. Blog 3. I agree that teachers should set examples and model appropriate behavior. If it's a 'Field Day' then the students should participate in field day activities not video games.
ReplyDeleteReva, the school that you are observing, what type of activities if any do they usually hold for the kids? I am curious because I don't think school in general is incorporating too many physical activities because of time. There is just not enough time through the day and let’s face it the only time these children are active is during recess or gym. I do agree schools should hold more physical activities and parents should be educated on obesity along with their child. I remember there was a child who was in second grade who teachers would rave about whose mom would literally bring McDonalds everyday for lunch! I just saw him several months ago, he is in high school and yes he is obese. I always felt bad because of the habits that were shown to him by his parents. Again I feel if this mom was given several classes on obesity maybe she would have been convinced that this was not a good idea.
ReplyDeleteIt would be nice if the school staff were able to incorporate small physical activities throughout the day. For instance, ten jumping jacks for every 30 minutes of sitting would help the children to get more exercise throughout the day.
ReplyDeleteHealthy school lunches and snacks that include fresh fruit and veggies would be great, too.
DeleteI agree that it is important to fight to prevent childhood obesity. Children who are obese or overweight tend to stay that way when they get older and it is more difficult for them to reach the weight that they should be at. I believe that prevention of obesity starts when children are very young. I work on the Wind River Reservation and there is a serious problem with obesity and diabetes. I have seen a three year old child that weighed almost ninety pounds! In my preschool classroom, I try to do as many physical movement activities as I can, and they do not have to even be traditional "exercises." I like how you pointed out that dancing was exercise as well. I also think that it is important to teach children good eating habits. I have seen co-workers literally shovel enormous serving sizes onto children's plates because they are worried that these children might not be getting enough food at home. I think that this does not help to prevent obesity. I try to teach children to take child-sized portions and stop before they get full. I think that the children where I work see food as something that is supposed to be taken in excess, and they do not know how to regulate their own appetite. We need to teach children to eat healthy, eat only what they need to, and exercise every day.
ReplyDeleteReva,
ReplyDeleteNice blog post. I think people do advocate for things that have affected them. For example, I chose literacy because my sister and son had problems with literacy at an early age. I think field days are great ideas to promote physical activity amongst our children. For instance, my children's school do something similar to this every month. They call it a fair and it usually has a theme, such as Halloween. Their activities include sack races, running races, basketball, baseball, jumping rope, and a ring toss. The children are informed that they have to stay healthy, exercise, and eat healthy. Also, I go to everyone of the fairs because I want my children to know I support them.