Physical Fitness
by Dave Harper
February 05, 2010
ARE WE READY?
I have taught Physical Education for many years and I presently am watching something that has become a major problem for our young people today. When I first arrived here, if I wanted to meet with a boy in the summer time I knew I needed to catch him before 9:00 AM or after 8:30 PM. That was because during the daylight hours he would be busy outside bailing hay, helping clean out hog sheds or working on a section gang on the railroad. Now I feel that I need to call him after 10:00 AM or before 4:00 PM because he is sleeping in or he needs to be at work at Burger King at 5:00 PM. Children are much more likely to stay inside and play with computer games than go out and play. In almost all cases activities that provide vigorous exercise are not an option for the youngster. Consequently young people are having a terrible time taking care of themselves in regard to maintaining and developing their overall fitness. Our eating habits have also changed. We have become a fast food society where we stop and buy foods that are already prepared usually deep fat fried. In most cases vigorous exercise is not a part of our already busy daily schedule. I see youngsters come out for activities and they think they are ready to run up and down the basketball floor, stopping and starting at full speed, or go out and run the 400 Meter dash. I see young men who have been sitting in the air conditioning playing video games try to come out and practice football in 85 to 90 degree weather. All these scenarios are possible accidents looking for a place to happen. This problem can be witnessed all the way down through our elementary grades where many students are not engaging in vigorous enough activities and the percentage of obese students is increasing. At this time it is predicted that 1 out of every 3 students in our schools will develop type 2 diabetes. How do we change this to our advantage?
Here are some thoughts on this.
- Make sure your child is getting at least an hour of vigorous exercise a day. It is already proven that the brain requires 20% more fresh oxygen than any other part of the body. It is a proven fact that vigorous exercise is helpful in creating new brain cells. If you have been watching television the NFL and the dairy association have joined to put the program together encouraging children to make sure they get 1 hour of vigorous exercise a day.
- Proper diet includes eating at least 5 different types of fruits and vegetables each day Add in something to supply protein and breads or pastas and the darker the bread the better. Drink more plain water. Lack of water is often misunderstood by our body being hungry. Four glasses of water a day should be a bare minimum.
- Proper rest is needed because your child is growing in so many ways. They feel they should get from 8 to 10 hours of sleep a night. This is because their bodies are constantly in various phases of development until they reach somewhere around 21.
What can we do now to help the situation and give our children the opportunity to be the best that we can be? Set a good example because they look up to and respect you Encourage your children to be as active as possible and this can take place all the way down through the elementary school. There are some programs offered here at school but there are also many of them out and around the community. Right now we should try to encourage our children to be as active as possible. I know Ed Thomas, the Physical Education consultant for the state of Iowa, has said time and time again that “If we teach and encourage our children to be active and mobile in the younger years they will continue to be mobile and active in the later years. Consequently, the opposite is also true. If we allow them to be sedentary and not active they will once again do the same thing in the latter years of their lives”. I know that this makes life difficult when in many cases two parents are working and it is pretty easy to tell your child to sit down and do your home work or watch the TV because that is the safest way to have them. Well getting the homework done is really great and it would be great if you would check it also. But then see if you can promote some activities that involve vigorous exercise. I know there are many activities provided at Pekin that apply to an extremely broad base of interests. These are there for our students to expand their horizons. In looking at our student body it usually holds true that the students that have trouble getting through school are usually not involved with anything at school. In many cases they also have problems with their academics.
There are a whole variety of things you can do to help out.
- Have your child help you to set up a station training program. We have just
finished doing this in our junior high and high school and the students really did
well with it..
- Have them run over and back to the neighbors for something and challenge them to see how fast they can get there and back.
3. Go out with them for a bicycle ride. It would be a great outing.
I know as we see our children grow we are all interested in them developing “A Sound Mind in a Sound Body. I know this cannot happen to our youth of today unless they begin to realize they will be the ones that are responsible for their own physical fitness.
With all of us working together to provide the opportunities, I am hopeful that we can get it done. I think we will be ready for this with a great team effort.
Tom Stone
