Get Rid of PE and Bullying In Schools

Page 4 of 8 [ 118 posts ]  Go to page Previous  1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8  Next

fightingalways
Tufted Titmouse
Tufted Titmouse

User avatar

Joined: 18 Apr 2006
Gender: Female
Posts: 25

07 Jun 2006, 11:49 am

How about having a specialized PE class? I was in one of those and I did just fine. If there is no speicalized class, there are ways to get out of it via the ADA laws.

I am also not coordinated and I never saw the point of sports.

"If a few students off themselves, so what, they were damaged goods anyways and they needed to tossed. The goods were no good to their masters and in large numbers, they could be dangerous. That is why the saying "If you would only change to be more like the rest of the group". "

Went to a district like that. I was grateful I moved to one that understood me and didn't have this attitude. How many more dead children is it going to take before people wake up and realize that bullying is a problem?



ljbouchard
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 4 Mar 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,278
Location: Rochester Minnesota

07 Jun 2006, 12:07 pm

<quote>How many more dead children is it going to take before people wake up and realize that bullying is a problem?</quote>

If the system is working as it is intended to work, they I would have to say an infinite number because no amount of children killing themselves will change things. :cry:


_________________
Louis J Bouchard
Rochester Minnesota

"Only when all those who surround you are different, do you truly belong."
---------------------------------------------------
Fred Tate Little Man Tate


Iammeandnooneelse
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 11 May 2006
Gender: Female
Posts: 380

07 Jun 2006, 2:40 pm

ljbouchard wrote:
<quote>How many more dead children is it going to take before people wake up and realize that bullying is a problem?</quote>

If the system is working as it is intended to work, they I would have to say an infinite number because no amount of children killing themselves will change things. :cry:


I agree with this.



ADoyle
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 16 Dec 2005
Age: 48
Gender: Female
Posts: 913
Location: Southern California, USA

07 Jun 2006, 6:32 pm

I don't think getting rid of PE is an option, much of it has been cut due to that joke called NCLB and standardized tests. There's already a serious epidemic of childhood obesity, which if there were more variety in PE classes, this could be dealt with. There needs to be more options than team sports or running the mile, which got me to hate running to this day. Schools would be better off with various activities that would appeal to a wide variety of interests, and promote fitness as part of a healthy lifestyle.

I really hated dodgeball in school, there was this one kid who would throw the ball at you so hard, you'd get knocked to the ground. I was the one who got targeted the most as he was one of the many bullies I had to deal with. PE wasn't the only time I was bullied, it happened throughout the school day, and when I told the teacher, she usually said that I was making it up, or that it was somehow my fault.

Despite that, PE has some good possibilities, at least in high school, I was able to use the marching band as PE credit as it was something I enjoyed.


_________________
"I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason,
and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."
- Galileo Galilei


Roybertito
Sea Gull
Sea Gull

User avatar

Joined: 18 Jan 2006
Gender: Male
Posts: 228
Location: In my office chair, spinning around.

08 Jun 2006, 12:17 am

fightingalways wrote:
How about having a specialized PE class? I was in one of those and I did just fine. If there is no speicalized class, there are ways to get out of it via the ADA laws.

I am also not coordinated and I never saw the point of sports.

"If a few students off themselves, so what, they were damaged goods anyways and they needed to tossed. The goods were no good to their masters and in large numbers, they could be dangerous. That is why the saying "If you would only change to be more like the rest of the group". "

Went to a district like that. I was grateful I moved to one that understood me and didn't have this attitude. How many more dead children is it going to take before people wake up and realize that bullying is a problem?


Yeah, they have specialized PE classes. I was in one.

They just mixed us 8 in with 50 (literally!) other normal kids.

So Modified PE doesn't even work.


_________________
Image


DaPurd
Emu Egg
Emu Egg

User avatar

Joined: 4 Jun 2006
Gender: Male
Posts: 8
Location: NYC

12 Jun 2006, 7:02 pm

Roybertito,

I absolutely hated gym when I was in school (in NYC), so much, that it was the first class that I cut regularly. I was picked on by both the students and teachers, despite coming prepared to class (proper attire) and putting forth a geniune effort.

I still resent my parents and school for not removing me from gym class, despite my constant complaints. In fact, when I was in graduate school, I co-authored a term paper arguing why New York State should eliminate gym classes or at least re-design them substanstially. Here are a couple of verbatim quotes from that paper (from the year 2000), with citations included:

DaPurd once wrote:
Research shows that there is widespread dissatisfaction with physical education experiences (Gillies and Hendry, 1978); which some suggest may scar them for life. Kathleen Vail elaborates, “children who hate gym class grow into adults who associate physical activity with ridicule and humiliation.” (Vail, 1999). In fact, a 1980 study shows that children who are less adept in sports and who feel unable to change this often decide to drop out of sporting activities entirely (Roberts, 1980) . . . Other research has suggested that physical education classes are competitive in a negative sense, rub salt into psychological wounds (Kulewicz, 1981) and may be responsible for higher stress among children (Bird, Cripe & Morrison, 1980). George Graham puts it bluntly “We know traditional physical education has been a failure.” (Vail, 1999) . . .

. . . "The competitive process generates self-shattering discouragement, disillusionment, and distrust. Children whose…skills lag…are denied the education they need.” (Kulewicz, 1981). Some studies suggest that this lack of athletic ability can be even worse for boys who may suffer ridicule if they show that they are not athletic in nature. “It doesn’t matter whether the student is brilliant or average so long as he is also athletic-minded.” (Tannenbaum, 1962)


I truly hope that you succeed in your efforts . . .

Regards,
DaPurd



ljbouchard
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 4 Mar 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,278
Location: Rochester Minnesota

12 Jun 2006, 8:05 pm

DaPurd,

I am surprised you got away with cutting class. NYS requires that all high schoolers complete 4 years of physical education. If you miss too much, they can keep you from getting your diploma. In fact, I knew a few students who were required to take extra gym classes in order to graduate.

Please note that I do not agree with this, I am just stating the facts.


_________________
Louis J Bouchard
Rochester Minnesota

"Only when all those who surround you are different, do you truly belong."
---------------------------------------------------
Fred Tate Little Man Tate


ilikedragons
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 Oct 2004
Gender: Female
Posts: 1,471

12 Jun 2006, 10:36 pm

Gym was my favorite class.



Enigmatic_Oddity
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 4 Nov 2005
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,555

13 Jun 2006, 2:57 am

Dapurd wrote:
Research shows that there is widespread dissatisfaction with academic experiences (Dillies and Fendry, 1978); which some suggest may scar them for life. Kathleen Wail elaborates, “children who hate academics grow into adults who associate thinking with ridicule and humiliation.” (Wail, 1999). In fact, a 1980 study shows that children who are less adept in academics and who feel unable to change this often decide to drop out of school altogether (Lobots, 1980) . . . Other research has suggested that all formal education may be competitive in a negative sense, rubbing salt into psychological wounds (Kulewikz, 1981) and may be responsible for higher stress among children (Bird, Gripe & Morrison, 1980). George Graham puts it bluntly “We know traditional education has been a failure.” (Wail, 1999) . . .

. . . "The competitive process generates self-shattering discouragement, disillusionment, and distrust. Children whose…thought lags…are denied the skills they need.” (Kulewicz, 1981). Some studies suggest that this lack of academic ability can be even worse for those who may suffer others' insufferable snobbishness if they show that they are not academic in nature. “It doesn’t matter whether the student is healthy or able to contribute as a functional member of society so long as they are also academia-minded.” (Tannenbaum, 1962)


Ok, I know this is dumb, but really... people who are intelligent but aren't great in physical education aren't the only ones who lose out in school. Schools just as easily break kids who aren't very bright, people who can still make a worthwhile contribution to society. I get the feeling here that some people, being rather intelligent but poor at sports, feel compelled to lash out at those who do enjoy sports, perhaps believing they're being 'oppressed' by them.



Iammeandnooneelse
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 11 May 2006
Gender: Female
Posts: 380

14 Jun 2006, 10:00 am

Read robyerito's posts.



McJeff
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 4 Nov 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 361
Location: The greatest country in the world: The USA

14 Jun 2006, 5:00 pm

I think that the reason PE is a bully-magnet isn't because of the students so much as the gym teachers. Like many of you have noted, bullying is sometimes not a problem in PE classes at all because the gym coaches don't tolerate it in the slightest, and they tend to be the kind of authority figure that bullies can't ignore.

(The only place I ever got badly bullied was in, of all things, a chorus class, and that was because the teacher had no control over the kids... but that's neither here nor there.)

The reason bullying becomes a problem is because some gym teachers actually identify with the bullies and despise the fat or unathletic kids for being fat and unathletic. Some gym teachers take the approach to discipline that the kid needs to learn to stand up for himself, and that intervention would only make the problem go away for a short time, then come back worse than before. I've had that happen with a teacher.

The other impulse that some gym coaches have is to get the unathletic kids "fighting mad". They incorrectly view a dispropensity for athletics and physical exertion as a flaw to be corrected, and perhaps they think that if the other kids bully them enough, they'll get tired of it and work to make themselves less targets. And honestly, this does work with many NT kids. It doesn't work with Aspies very often though.

And of course, some coaches are still caught in the jock mentality, and can be bullies themselves. When I played little league soccer, there was a coach for one of the opposing teams that pushed his own players around.

As for Phys-Ed itself...

My high school had a system set up somewhat like college, in that kids could select which class they took to cover their PE credits. One was a technical know-how of sports class, for those who were physically handicapped or otherwise unable to play. Then they had physical fitness class, and sports-class. In the fitness class, you were graded based partly on participation in the class, and partly on what kind of improvements you made. I saw one kid in my high school lose 75 lbs in that class.



CockneyRebel
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Jul 2004
Age: 49
Gender: Male
Posts: 113,289
Location: Stalag 13

14 Jun 2006, 10:08 pm

Why is it, that kids get more Rude, in PE than they do in any of their other classes. That used to annoy me, when I was in High School. One day, my Grade 9 Girls PE Class had a Substitute Teacher and we were playing Basketball. Everybody was tackling one another. I didn't get into it. I've just stood at the line and waited for my Team Mates to throw me the Ball, and than I've shot for the Basket.



McJeff
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 4 Nov 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 361
Location: The greatest country in the world: The USA

22 Jun 2006, 3:14 pm

CockneyRebel wrote:
Why is it, that kids get more Rude, in PE than they do in any of their other classes. That used to annoy me, when I was in High School. One day, my Grade 9 Girls PE Class had a Substitute Teacher and we were playing Basketball. Everybody was tackling one another. I didn't get into it. I've just stood at the line and waited for my Team Mates to throw me the Ball, and than I've shot for the Basket.


Physical competition causes increased adrenaline, which in turn causes people to become more aggressive. Some people are affected more by it than others.



TheMachine1
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 11 Jun 2006
Gender: Male
Posts: 8,011
Location: 9099 will be my last post...what the hell 9011 will be.

22 Jun 2006, 5:44 pm

Please delete all my posts.



Last edited by TheMachine1 on 29 Jun 2006, 4:10 am, edited 1 time in total.

InfidelMatt
Hummingbird
Hummingbird

User avatar

Joined: 17 Jun 2006
Gender: Male
Posts: 22

22 Jun 2006, 11:53 pm

I have to say that throughout this thread I am very much on 'Iammeandnooneelse's side of the fence here. However, to best articulate my thoughts, I want to itemize each subject at a time and give my thoughts on it.

Physical Education

I have never been, am not, and never will be, an athlete. I have never had any inclination to or interest in being so. When I was growing up, I was interested in science fiction and art and..well..girls :oops: I am not an athlete and if kids are not interested nor inclined towards athletics, they should not be made to participate. I am going to be blunt here. I hate athletics. Seriously! I hate sports! With a bitter passion! I hate it to death! I never did well in athletics. When I took P.E. we'd begin by having exercises and then it was some kind of sport. While I liked exercise, I hated sports bitterly. I don't recall being bullied in P.E. class that much (perhaps I was but have since blocked the memory out) but the fact is that I am not an athlete.

The problem is that in our society, we have it in our minds that to be a productive member of society, we need to learn to be competitive. And we are told in society that the best way to be competitive is to be involved in sports. Not me! I have never been competitive and have never had any desire to be involved in sports. I am grateful that I was never looked down on in my family for disliking sports. My father was a sports fan but was very graceful about it- no pressure, no "Well Matt, you're just a little girly-boy" or any crap like that. He understood from day one that not all kids are athletically-inclined and he deserves nothing but praise for that!

In society, we are looked down on if we are not athletically-inclined. There is this stereotype that if you are not into sports or athletic, then you are a "girly-boy" or a "sissy". I have been called worse with profanities that needn't be listed here. I have a proposal for the P.E. problem. I think we need to realize a distinction between the athletically-inclined and the not-so-athletically-inclined. I believe that P.E. should not be a compulsory class. I think it should be one of multiple options. For kids who are not into sports or athletically-inclined, schools should offer something I call "Basic Health" which is a course on nutrition and exercise. I would have excelled in this class! I hate to think that if I did better in school and was studying my rear off to get into an Ivy League school, I wouldn't have been accepted because I couldn't throw a baseball as good as the jocks.

Kids who are natural athletes and athletically-inclined can then take a P.E. course and excel in what is their natural habitat. But, for the love of all that is sacred, kids that age like I was, don't need to be in a class where the kids are playing baseball or what-have-you. It doesn't help when kids my age have A.S. What many more teachers need to realize is that each kid is different and this isn't some kind of hive where we are all bees. We also have to have more educators (and parents, for Pete's sake!) realize that not all kids are competitive. I wasn't and no one had any real business putting me into an environment that is naturally competitive. I believe that P.E. should be an elective for the athletically-inclined and we should have "Basic Health" classes or something like this for the nonathletes.

Bullies

I have to be careful here. I have a difficult time talking about this without having deeply angry feelings or even feelings of rage and hate. I was bullied. Although I think that schools might do best with the solution I have above in terms of P.E. reform, bullying is a more severe problem. I have nothing but loathe and contempt for bullies. I have a hard time seeing bullies in any different light than law enforcement sees sexual predators who are online trying to seduce teenagers or adolescents. One problem is that bullies cannot be reasoned with. I have learned this the hard way. Often I tend to think that the only way to solve the problem with bullies is to take bullies and inflict brutally violent pain on them to the point where they're screaming at the top of their lungs in the most bitter, ear-shattering pitch you have ever heard. Yet this won't work. This is not just sinking to their level- this is going much lower and you wind up becoming a bigger monster than many of these bullies have made themselves out to be.

I question whether we need kids who are bullies in the schools. Sometimes I get the impression that they're just a drain on resources and wasting the teachers' time when they pick on someone in a class and they cause needless misery to students who don't deserve and should've have to be picked on in the first place! But I cannot think of where else to put them except in military school. I chuckle at the thought of a platoon seargant yelling at the top of his lungs in some bully's face like the seargant on the movie Full Metal Jacket. In fact, I am quite infatuated with this solution although I don't know if this would work in real life. But I tend to think that if bullies were sent off to military school, they'd change their tune, learn to be responsible and respectful, and perhaps even learn to be patriotic!

But if we have to have these slimeballs with us, we need to get drastically strict with anti-bullying rules. I hate the thought of resorting to Draconian measures but I'm willing to if that's the only way to nip the problem in the bud. We need strong measures and swift punishments for bullying. And for crying out loud- some people need to stop attacking the victims of bullying (i.e. "Well, you wouldn't get bullied if you weren't such a sissy!" ). Each person is a unique individual and should've have to learn to fight back or be a conformist just to escape being bullied or teased. Bullies, if they can be reformed, need to be taught to respect people and need to be made aware that there are stiff and harsh consequences for bullying or teasing people.

Matthew



Iammeandnooneelse
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 11 May 2006
Gender: Female
Posts: 380

23 Jun 2006, 10:06 am

Right. At the end of the day, though some of the **** just needs to be used in a different way to become half-useful.
Poster at school "If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude"
I will proceed to explain why this seems to be absolute rubbish. I don't like being bullied. According to that poster, I should change it. So I try to change it, it backfires and makes it worse. According to that poster, I should now learn to like it.
WTF? That ignorance probably doesn't help.

However, bullying may be due to irrespionble adults, maybe they don't understand how serious it is. Following that line of thought:
So let's change it.
Let's print out research.
Let's get some documents and stories out there.
Let's show that is a problem.
Let's work as a team - our skills will HELP.
We have the advantage of globlaixing yet localizing.
We can spread out and do this at our various schools yet set up HQ here at wrongplanet.
Let's do what we can - NOW, before we have any more dead children.
Who's with me?