School Places Premium On Physical Exercise, PE Class

LEANDER, TX -- Remember recess? Those of us of a certain age remember the period during school we’d be allowed to socialize, run -- and, yes, even romp and sometimes skip -- as a reinvigorating way to re-engage in what otherwise seemed like an interminable school day.

Officials at one Leander school understand the importance of such intermittent periods of down time to to get the juices flowing and re-attain focus.

Founders Classical Academy balances school activity with a robust in-class curriculum, KVUE-TV reports. So much so, they grant some students up to three recess breaks a day and a daily, 30-minute physical exercise session.

“The curriculum is advanced and it is rigorous,” headmaster Kathleen O’Toole told the television station. “But we know that our kids are not college students.”

With that in mind, school students from kindergarten through 11th grade are allowed -- nay, encouraged -- to get up and move throughout the day.

Kiddos from kindergarten to second grade truly luxuriate in the privilege, getting three recess breaks a day lasting 15 minutes each.

Fifth-grader Jonah Swartz likes this part of the school period.

“We learn history, like feudal Japan or imperial Russia,” the child precociously told the television station.

His mother, Tanja Swartz, endorses the recreational breaks as an outlet for kids’ seemingly indefatigable energy levels. Coupled with a strict teaching regiment, she welcomes the balance.

“Everybody sits forward, everybody faces the teacher,” she noted. “It’s very serious. But they can do that if they’re given the opportunity to go out and run around and use their bodies and get some of their energy out.”

Even while recreation time is on a sliding scale depending on children’s age levels, Jonah acknowledged the breaks are helping him achieve a positive behavioral balance while he studies heady concepts like the aforementioned feudal period of the Japanese empire where the sun never set or the once-mighty Russian empire existing over two centuries that once stretched over three continents.

“I don’t know how to explain it,” he said. “I would sort of be a ruckus -- and I still do that at this school sometimes -- but most of the time I’m focused because all my energy has gone out.”

Nationally, the benefits of physical education, particularly among school children, have also come into greater focus. First Lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” initiative promotes the tactics of physical exertion for myriad health reasons, including as an early step toward preventing obesity in children.