Some background from the New York Times:
Trump Is Bringing Back the Presidential Fitness Test - The New York Times
"...President Trump signed an executive order to reinstate the Presidential Fitness Test in public schools. The move is part of the administration’s goal to “restore urgency in improving the health of all Americans,” according to a statement released by the White House.
"The test, which was introduced in 1966, has taken several forms over the years. The most recent version included a one-mile run, modified sit-ups, a 30-foot shuttle run, the sit-and-reach flexibility test and a choice between push-ups and pull-ups....the Trump administration has yet to announce which exercises will be included in the new test."
"...In 2012, the Obama administration replaced the Presidential Fitness Test with a program called the Presidential Youth Fitness Program, which was less focused on standardized fitness benchmarks."
"Some fitness and child development experts have criticized the Presidential Fitness Test as too rigid. Children who are the same age, for instance, could be very different sizes or at different developmental stages. And focusing on scores, experts said, could risk turning some children off exercise altogether."
Full disclosure: I was the class klutz. I missed the heyday of the Presidential Fitness Test by being in Catholic grade schools where they did not have formal PE classes. Instead we had several long recesses. I did not excel at that, either. One game I remember was Red Rover. Some of you probably played it; a line of kids joined hands and clasped arms, and the other side would send kids to try to break through. The biggest boy would always head for my skinny little arm, and I would drop my arm out of fear. One kid actually did break an arm, so the teachers forbade Red Rover from then on. There were some other not quite so bad games, I kind of liked Red Light, Green Light, and Cigarette Tag. I made up a game I called Solar System Tag, where you had to get to all eight of the planets to win. Some kids would play that, but most thought it was too dorky. I was too dorky.
Sometimes the girls played softball. My position was outfielder. when the ball went into the sticker patch in the ditch beyond the playground, it was my job to go down and get it.
I actually did like to play croquet and badminton at home. Grandma had given us a set of those games. My brothers did Little League for awhile, and I wasn't too bad at pitching balls to them for practice.
I didn't encounter an actual PE class until 9th grade, when I started public high school. I hated every minute of it, and hated the arsenic green gym outfits we had to wear.
Fortunately 9th grade was all that was required. The other public school kids had had PE in 6th through 9th grades.
Our teacher had two grades he would give: A and D. You got an A if you showed up and halfway tried, and didn't give him grief. You got a D if you were disrespectful or caused trouble with other kids. the reason he gave Ds instead of Fs for the "ne'r-do-wells" is that he didn't want them back the next year to make up the credit. I got an A, even though I still sucked at it.
As an adult I have always enjoyed walking and that is my exercise of choice, so I didn't grow up to be a total couch potato.
In my opinion, the department of Health and Human Services would do much better to concentrate on things like not throwing people off access to their healthcare, not destroying trust in vaccinations, and not cancelling support for cancer research. Making more tests for kids to pass is a distraction from larger issues.
I remember the fitness tests. The boys who excelled at sports (and nothing else) would stand at the sidelines and make nasty comments. I always did the requisite 50 sit ups to make up for the fact that I had less upper body strength and could not do max push ups or run very fast. I had scoliosis, and I was by God determined not to wimp out and get branded the class hunchback.
ReplyDeleteBut I enjoyed PE at times. Took fencing in high school. We had little intramural competitions and I was very good at it. I guess stabbing people was my forte ...
"I actually did like to play croquet and badminton at home."
ReplyDeleteMe, too. We had those games at the cabin. I had completely forgotten about that. I had an archery set up there, too. TV reception at the cabin was not very good, so alternatives were necessary.
I hated PE and recess, too.
Our high school like other high schools in SW Pennsylvania was very sports oriented. Not very academically oriented. Most guys expected to work in the steel mills, and the girls to become housewives.
Not many of us were on the college bound track. I identified with and was friends with the science and math teachers. At the same time, I was very involved with the parish as head of the servers.
My parents were not very into team sports. By high school age my brothers were big tall guys. The coaches at school wanted them to play football. One of the coaches came around and talked to Dad about it. Dad said he wasn't stopping them from playing. If they wanted to they could. But he needed them to help in the field during haying season. Practice started in the summer. If the boys could figure out how to do both, they were welcome to try. But they weren't very interested. The older of the two brothers did figure out how to be in a rock band and do field work too, though. He played guitar and bass in his band all through high school. We joked that the reason he got a masters degree in computer science was to support his music habit. I think he still plays in a grandpa band.
DeleteOh, yes, the haying season! All hands in the fields and the barn. My whole family was out to help my grandfather. I was the water boy. The reward was to ride the wagon back to the barn.
DeleteDuring the years that we had the cabin, an important form of exercise for me was biking, a three speed on relatively flat terrain around the lake, about fifty miles a day. I did this almost every morning when I was at the cabin.
DeleteWhen I was working at the mental health center in Toledo, one summer I wore shorts to the agency picnic. The next day I was told that my "great legs" were the topic of conversation among the women. I just enjoyed the great morning ride around the edge of the lake, mostly on roads that did not have much traffic.
Re Katherine's comments on what HHS could do ...
ReplyDeleteTrump has slapped a 50 percent tariff on India, where a lot of our generic drugs come from. China is the biggest provider--something like 90 percent of our generic Rd and OTC. So most of us will be paying more for our meds, and, if India follows China's lead, will slow the supply of generics to the US to pressure better trade deals.
My chemo pills come from India. Asked the pharmacist yesterday when I went to get refills if she was seeing shortages. She said, "not yet, but that's a fair question."
So many great things coming out of RFKs worm-eaten brain.
I was a miserable athlete and suffered through two years of phys ed classes (freshman and sophomore years) at an all-boys Catholic high school. The "education" consisted of "classes" in which the more popular and/or athletic boys were designated as team captains and allowed to choose, one at a time, players for their teams, until the last boy was chosen. That last boy was usually either me or a fat kid named Tim Skelly. It was humiliating, and I hated it.
ReplyDeletePresident Kennedy's physical fitness test was started my sophomore year. I found out about it the morning of the day I was to take the test. To make a long story short, I was fairly confident I could do everything required except touch my toes. I went off by myself during lunch hour and attempted to touch my toes again and again until I could do it. That afternoon when I took the test, I succeeded in doing all the required exercises. It caused somewhat of a sensation. I remember hearing people in the hallways whispering to each other, "Did you hear Nickol got a perfect score?"
There was no education in my high school physical education. When I went off to Ohio State, physical education was again required, but you were allowed to pick from a wide array of physical activities, and you were actually taught something.
High school phys ed was soul crushing.
I remember the fitness tests getting harder as we got older. There was a 1K run. I didn't know enough to pace myself and barfed after I finished. The teacher apologized to us for not giving us better coaching and gave us a second chance at it if we wanted. I did ok then.
ReplyDeleteOur gym classes were girls-only after grade 6, I think because of the sex ed component. Girls got the Kotex movies with bunnies and flowers. The boys apparently got a movie with some guy in a white lab coat and a pointer talking about nocturnal emissions and venereal disease.
LOL, by starting PE class in 9th grade, I missed the Kotex movie with bunnies and flowers. Needless to say we did not get that in Catholic school. Fortunately my mom clued me in about the basics well ahead of time.
DeleteThe Kotex movie came too late for a lot of us who went thru early puberty. I get that they were trying for a positive spin on things, but the info was laughable. We had two super nice phys ed teachers who provided free sanitary products and deodorant for us girls and were encouraging and sensible about make up and clothes.
DeleteI too am a natural klutz. As a young child in LA I had recess in the Catholic school.we rode bikes and roller skated at home. I was fine with those. I gave those up when we moved to the mountains because there weren’t any mostly flat streets in my neighborhood. I was terrible at sports and hated every minute of high school PE - required 5 days/week for all four years. But I grew up in a lake resort community. Being able to water ski was a social requirement. I had a couple of rich friends with boats. It took me a while, and lots of falls, but eventually I became pretty good at it - single ski, hopping the wake etc. Those summers were the peak of my athletic career. After college I tried many things - tennis, running, gyms, jazzercisr, etc. I usually dropped out of whatever class or program I tried after three sessions. So I walked.
DeleteI was never interested in sports. My gym classes were a waste of time. They had no interest in whether I was healthy or not. The gym teacher was only interested in coaching the athletes. It wasn’t until I graduated from college that I was interested in physical fitness, mostly as a part of self defense. I joined a karate school, started running and weightlifting and it was a wonderful experience. I felt as if I was on a low gravity planet. The sense of freedom was exhilirating. Now I’m on the inevitable far side of the parabola and I feel like I’m mostly slowing the descent. I think one of the benefits of physical fitness is better mental fitness.
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