One of the most frustrating things that happen on a way too frequent basis is students who don't go to PE because they are held back by a classroom teacher. The student being held back is almost always from upper elementary or middle school. The pressures of academic achievement mean that things are sacrificed at the altar of grades. They missed a test day and need to make it up. They did poorly on a test and are doing a retake. They didn’t finish work, which was past due, so they stayed in to finish it. They didn’t turn in their homework. If a student was misbehaving in class and not listening to the teacher, they missed PE. None of these reasons should be acceptable. PE should be a non-negotiable.
Why is it acceptable to miss PE (and other cocurricular classes)? When did this become common practice? Teachers and administrators will wax poetic about how much they and their students love co-curricular classes but turn around and pull a student from the class for the sake of convenience without a second thought. This mixed message is not lost upon us co-curricular teachers, who try hard to bring meaningful content to the students. How much value do you see in my PE class when a student can be held back for any reason?
At best, we get pandered to with a backhanded compliment. “Students love your class so much! They hate when they have to miss it!” This is code that PE can be used to enforce behavior. PE has become incentivized. Do what you are told, and you can go to PE. This means classroom teachers think one of the best uses of your class is to be the carrot on a stick. Unfortunately, this means some classroom teachers view gym class as not having enough worth on its own to be something that would never be considered skippable.
PE should be as skippable as a math lesson. As a former classroom teacher, I know I would not sacrifice a math lesson because a student misbehaved. This is a classic case of robbing Peter to pay Paul. You are taking away the instruction time that they need. Yet this rationale is used for PE quite often. Even worse, a student might realize they can game the system. If missing PE is being used as a punishment, and this student wants to avoid PE, they can exploit this scenario. All they have to do is do something wrong or create a problem, and they will be rewarded by skipping a class they wanted to, and now it was sanctioned by the classroom teacher. This is not a good lesson to teach our students.
Adults show students that some classes are more valuable than others. Then we wonder why behaviors can be so different in cocurricular than in the classroom. Children notice these differences, and for some, it is permission for them to blow them off. To make matters worse, lots of our co-curricular teachers have not had formal classroom management training like classroom teachers. As a result, we have set the stage for students to look at a co-curricular as "less than," which will do nothing to help a co-curricular teacher enforce correct behaviors.
Ever had an adult done such bad a job that you can't believe it? It could be a coworker or even a significant other. The famous sitcom trope is that if someone does a bad enough job, you will do the job for them in the future out of sheer frustration. Laziness, incompetence, quiet quitting, call it whatever you want. I frequently see adults not putting effort into a job or task they don't like. Where do we think they learned this behavior from? I’m sure parents are to blame to some extent. However, I can't help but think that this avoidance behavior could also be learned in school when we incentivize lousy behavior by missing classes.
As PE teachers, what are we supposed to do? Everyone knows that PE is valuable from a health perspective. The students need physical activity, which PE provides. However, that is not enough reason to elevate PE in the eyes of classroom teachers or administrators. Denial of recess is often used as a punishment for children, which sets a precedent for being held back from PE. Unfortunately, we need to elevate PE to a level that makes it undeniably essential and cannot be missed. PE needs to become a crucial part of the curriculum again. How do we do that?
Integrate with the classroom curriculum.
Blurring the lines between gym class and the classroom raises the importance of PE. The goal is for teachers to second guess whether it is acceptable for their students to skip gym, especially if gym is a place where the students are “learning.” All it takes are a few success stories from students saying they learned a concept in the PE class instead of the classroom. Then, the classroom teacher will realize that their kinesthetic learner is correctly taking in the information in a setting that encourages the movement that that student desperately needs. An integrated PE program becomes a teaching aid instead of a holding cell.
Here are some research links (1, 2, 3, 4) I have done which show the efficacy of integrating PE with the classroom curriculum by increasing vocabulary and learning classroom concepts. This data should persuade PE teachers to consider involving classroom concepts in their PE games. Furthermore, this data should persuade classroom teachers even more that PE can be a supplement to the classroom instruction they are giving the students. Think of integrated PE as your educational multivitamin. At worst, it does no harm. At best, it fills in the educational gaps the way a vitamin might, especially for students who have preferential learning tendencies geared towards movement.