Monday, November 25, 2002
Do Children Need Recess? - The Website
Recess has become a political issue. Apparently, school systems all across our beloved educational landscape are beginning to eliminate recess. Mostly out of fear. Fear that kids will get hurt (and parents sue). Fear that kids will be deprived of sorely needed instruction time. And parents who remember how important recess can be find themselves, and their kids, at a loss. A big loss.
Do Children Need Recess? offers recess advocates (and play advocates and your basic child advocates) a much-needed resource. It is a compendium of links to solid, researched, expert opinions about the importance of recess, including position statements from education and health associations, articles on the connections between recess and social development, physical activity, academic achievement, playground safety. Even a petition form that parents can use to try to restore school board sanity.
Did you know, for example, that according to Jarrett, Maxwell,Dickerson, Hoge, Davies and Yetley, that:
A subsequent analyses of variance indicated that the 43 children, who were used as their own controls, differed on recess and nonrecess days, becoming more on task and less fidgety when they had recess. Sixty percent of the children, including all 5 of those with attention deficit disorder, and a balance of boys and girls benefited considerably. They worked more or fidgeted less (or both) on recess days.
It's a sad truth that we need to prove what we know so intuitively. It's a boon to us all that there are those who are providing it for us.
Do Children Need Recess? offers recess advocates (and play advocates and your basic child advocates) a much-needed resource. It is a compendium of links to solid, researched, expert opinions about the importance of recess, including position statements from education and health associations, articles on the connections between recess and social development, physical activity, academic achievement, playground safety. Even a petition form that parents can use to try to restore school board sanity.
Did you know, for example, that according to Jarrett, Maxwell,Dickerson, Hoge, Davies and Yetley, that:
A subsequent analyses of variance indicated that the 43 children, who were used as their own controls, differed on recess and nonrecess days, becoming more on task and less fidgety when they had recess. Sixty percent of the children, including all 5 of those with attention deficit disorder, and a balance of boys and girls benefited considerably. They worked more or fidgeted less (or both) on recess days.
It's a sad truth that we need to prove what we know so intuitively. It's a boon to us all that there are those who are providing it for us.
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