The Newark public elementary school where I have been a volunteer tutor of third and fourth graders for several years has many strengths: beguiling students, dedicated administration and hard-working teachers. But it has one weakness that makes the school day more difficult for students as well as teachers, a deficiency that is now common in public schools: the elimination of ample physical education programs.
In one particular third grade, in which I spend two hours each Tuesday, the students are particularly restive. Some of the 15 students are on medications that treat illnesses caused by their parents’ substance abuse problems before the children were born.
Other students can’t sit still because they devour sugared foods in large quantities before they leave for school: chips and sodas, cookies and chocolate drinks—whatever gives a sleep-deprived youngster enough of a “stir” to get him moving out the front door and toward the school by 8:30 a.m.
Once the children have arrived, the school provides additional stimulation: bagels with cream cheese, muffins, apple juice—more sugar to stimulate our already lively youngsters. So, by the time serious study is meant to begin, 15 third graders are roaming the room, disappearing in closets, ducking out of the classroom door, squatting under desks, leaping to look out of windows in the event there is excitement on the street. My heart pounds in sympathy for the teacher, whose energy, understandably, is already flagging.
One morning, I attempted a rescue. “On your feet!” I shouted to the kids, who tend to view me as the classroom equivalent of a noncustodial parent, always an occasion for festivity. “You are young warriors! You must learn the discipline of tai chi—you are meant to strive for the good life!” (Tai chi is a martial art that requires of its practitioners stillness, balance, “soft strength.” It is particularly helpful in relieving agitation of both body and spirit.) “So do what I tell you, and do it well!”
What followed this dramatic announcement was, first, stunned silence, then rejoicing—“warriors!” What good news! I had time to quickly modify tai chi exercises into some movements the kids could do. I had them accompany the movements with their new mantra: “Be strong. Be steady. Be calm.” And while we held our positions, we quietly discussed what we meant by steadiness (not “flying off the handle,” not “acting out”) and calmness (“going with the flow,” not resisting every change and every instruction).
I was amazed by the genuine calm that fell over all the students as we worked our exercises for about 20 minutes. Energy that was being spent in distracting, pointless and, from the teacher’s perspective, irritating activity was now spent in conscious quietude, focus on textbook, sharpened listening to the lesson. Tai chi warriors! Focused, disciplined, in control of themselves.
But a question plagued me: Why were these students so “antsy” all morning long? Antsy for mornings, afternoons, entire days? The answer wasn’t hard to learn: Students in this, as in so many urban public school districts, have one physical education class per week. A meager 50 minutes of exercise. All of that childhood energy, which more affluent schools are able to organize into games, teams, competitions, is squeezed and repressed into inactive classroom routine: no kickball, no jungle gyms, no run around the track—no nothing. Except for one hour a week.
My tai chi warriors will, I have no doubt, learn to fend for themselves. But I have such terrible worry that how they will fend for themselves will be in antisocial and personally destructive ways. “Be calm” may easily translate into “Be cool.” Right now in class my kids run around the teacher and, in so doing, miss much of her generous instruction. Later I fear they may run away from other opportunity, other well-meaning authority; physical activity may consist of the swagger instead of the stride.
No one at the school could explain the elimination of physical education periods and simply alluded to a directive from the local board of education. Is physical exercise eliminated so that more study can take place? So that standardized test scores will be higher? So that the school administration can argue that “we are doing everything possible to meet academic standards”? Is exercise too expensive to offer to children every school day?
Whatever the answers to these questions, they seem to me shortsighted. Children learn from whatever they are doing. And they learn best when they are physically comfortable: well rested, well fed and well exercised. They learn best when they are able to “be strong, be steady, and be calm.”
Elizabeth Mitchell, former director of the Honors College at Rutgers-Newark, is a volunteer in a Newark public school. Posted August 2005.
