Last year, I was teaching a bouncy folkdance to a group of first graders, when many students began coughing uncontrollably. Their teacher looked at me, and looked at her students. These six-year-olds had to stop to catch their breath.
David Kahan points out that hough the National Association for Sports and Physical Education recommends 60 minutes of vigorous physical activity per day for every child, only one in five American schools provide more than 60 minutes per week of Physical Education instruction.
Another study showed that children in typical classrooms spend 97 percent of their time sitting.
And though "recess" has its origins in the 1600's, in present-day America, only 3 out of 4 schools provide regularly scheduled recess of 20-30 minutes to all grades.
In Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, John J. Ratey, M.D. describes how physical activity encourages brain cells to fire together, and wire together. "For the brain to learn," he says, "these connections must be made; they reflect the brain's fundamental ability to adapt to challenges. The more neuroscientists discover about this process, the clearer it becomes that exercise provides an unparalleled stimulus, creating an environment in which the brain is ready, willing, and able to learn."
We benefit from any increase in exercise. For instance:
Dynamic "moving" classrooms encourage children to seek out dedicated space to gently bounce on a physio ball, to stand, to walk in place, or to stretch.
Movement sequences based on brain patterns, such as the Brain Dance, developed by Anne Green Gilbert, can serve as a transition before, during or after any part of a lesson.
Children have recess up to three times each day in the United Kingdom, improving their overall health and achievement.
David Katz, M.D. of the Yale School of Public Health includes dance in his list of the top ten ways to get active. Cooperative, inclusive, dance offers an intriguing solution to the problem of our sedentary lifestyle. Dance says, "Get moving."
And with just 15 minutes per day of dancing, a child can increase cardio, strength and flexibility capacity, while having all kinds of fun. Those daily 15 minutes, over a year, can be life-changing.
Activities like dance respond to new research that demonstrates how the quality of movement experience actually strengthens the brain's ability to adapt to change. Physical activity that is improvisational in nature, that invites a sense of adventure and exploration, leads to greater behavioral flexibility.
In our creative dance classes, students dive under the water, fly through space. They become magnets, whirlpools, and pupae. They solve problems, and by engaging in this rigorous, sequential, multi-sensory approach, before long they've mastered abstract concepts and can relate them to the everyday. This physical, social and cognitive process helps children gain skills and confidence to conceptualize, develop, test and refine new ideas.
The Oregon Department of Education affirms, "The arts are where learning starts, from a childŐs first exploration of meaning on a page by finger painting to an adult's use of the arts to develop, understand and communicate new ideas. The fundamental way in which we experience our world and express our selves is through the arts, and arts education develops essential skills and abilities for successful 21st century citizens."
All Oregon school districts are required to provide a K-12 arts curriculum that is aligned to the Oregon Arts Content Standards.
But arts assessment is a local responsibility.
After completing an integrated arts program that fused dance and academics, local k-3rd grade students reflected on their experience this way:
"We learned about self control, and thinking before acting."
"Dance lets us have more energy. We get to move. And Learning to relax helps you to concentrate."
"Dance makes you want to study more."
Essential work must be done to support the shifts in policy that would allow more children access to the full range of their learning potential.