Dana Helton
EDUC 1005-1: Professor Eissler
October 11, 2009
Section 5: Physical Fitness
There are many reasons why physical fitness is so important for young children. I will list a few.
The child has a bigger risk of becoming over weight and obese if they are not physical.
Too many children are eating unhealthy and sitting around the house watching television or playing video games. All children and adults should have an active lifestyle if they want to live a longer life.
Young children need to develop their large motor skills, which can only be done when the child gets up and moves around.
If children are more active then their muscles will be stronger and they will have a better chance of keeping their muscle strength through out the lives.
If children are not active and physical then the child has a greater chance of getting an illness that is hard to get rid of. Our bodies are not meant to sit around and do nothing. Not taking care of our bodies will create many health problems, which we could prevent if we started to eat healthier and move our bodies all the time.
There are many developmental stages that are occurring for 3-5 year old children. First one is, children are learning perception and how to throw and catch a ball. The best way we can help children to develop this stage to the fullest, is to play catch with different sized balls. I would also suggest monkey in the middle, baseball, basketball, or sit down in a big circle and sing songs and roll the ball back and forth. Children really love to play games and so do I. This is why I come up with fun ways to bring children together and start conversations. I really believe we can help all children grow and learn important life skills while playing. Listening to the children and their thoughts and ideas, will turn into an interesting lesson that touches on many developmental learning areas.
Second area that is developing is a child’s ability to hop, jump, and balance on one foot. I know of many children who love to climb up on the table or chairs and stand. Some children do this because they are playing the role of an adult and really believe that the adult they are pretending to be should be taller. Many children will act out what they see around them. It may not be something they saw from their parents but it could be something they saw on television. I also know children who climb up and love to see how far they can jump. Most teachers yell at the children and tell them to do something else. It is important for children to develop this skill. I can understand the teacher’s feelings about a child getting hurt. However, instead of yelling at them we could get children together and make a game where they can see how far they all can jump; you could even use a ruler and measure the distance and chart it. Hula-hoops are great to have because there are many ideas and fun games to play with hula-hoops. Examples are basketball, dance inside and outside of them, roll them in a circle, car driving, musical hoops, and mud puddles (Schilling, & McOmber, 2006).
Third area that is developing is muscle control. Children need to use all their muscles and they are supposed to have at least 60 minutes of structured physical activity a day (National Association for Sport and Physical Education, 2006). I believe that children need a lot more then 60 minutes of physical activity a day. You can incorporate physical movements into any lesson you are working on so there is no excuse why children aren’t moving around. All you need to do is have children use their bodies to move around. I am not a big believer in stopping children from moving around to sit and color in a pre made picture. This is useless to me. I am a hands on, move around, type of teacher who teaches children to experiment and come up with their own ideas to discuss. I believe I get better results being this kind of teacher. A couple suggestions could be dancing to music, going for walks, bowling, making an obstacle course to go through, exercising, making dumbbells, act out animal movements for charades, riding a bike, reading a book and acting out the parts of it, making your body into letters of the alphabet, cut out designs to make a puppet show or a collage, find colors and shapes around the room, put a little ball on a spoon and have a race, and make charts of all the activities we did that day and let children make suggestions for activities for the next day (Goodway & Robinson, 2006).
We can also get the parents more involved by asking them to join us when we create an obstacle course. Parents could give us ideas of their own, for physical activities too. I believe children would love it if parents came in and played with us. It is very important to get everyone involved if we expect children to stay healthy. We must constantly show positive role modeling to children because they always look up to us and we owe it to children to always do our best and make sure they grow up healthy, happy, competent, and have strong self-esteem.
My most famous quote for fostering healthy and well-developed children is, one I read from Barabara Colorose; “If kids come to us (educators/teachers) from strong, healthy functioning families, it makes our job easier. If they do not come to us from strong, healthy, functioning families, it makes our job more important. This statement touched my heart because I love to help and teach children to the best of my ability. I firmly believe that we need to take better care of ourselves starting at home and at school with healthier eating and exercising every day. We must stop sitting around watching television with a microwaved food dish, chips, and a soda. There is more to life then that, we must get up and live life to the fullest. This is what I live for; teaching and loving children unconditionally.
Resources
Goodway, J. D., & Robinson, L. E. (2006, March). SKIPing toward an active start: Promoting physical activity in preschoolers. Beyond the Journal: Young Children on the Web. Retrieved from http://www.journal.naeyc.org/btj/200605/GoodwayBTJ.asp
National Association for Sport and Physical Education. (2006, May). Active start: Physical activity guidelines for children birth to five years. Beyond the Journal: Young Children on the Web. Retrieved from http://journal.naeyc.org/btj/200605/NASPEGuidelinesBTJ.pdf
Schilling, T., & McOmber, K. A. (2006, May). Tots in action on and beyond the playground. Beyond the Journal: Young Children on the Web. Retrieved from http://journal.naeyc.org/btj/200605/SchillingBTJ.pdf
Think Exist Quotations Web site. Retrieved on October 9, 2009, from, http://thinkexist.com/quotes/barbara_colorose/
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Dana
ReplyDeleteI never thought of a child on the table trying to be a grown up. You have some great ideas.
Thanks
Loni
Interesting ideas for getting the children active. The teacher needs to be creative but needs to have control in the classroom. If the children want to climb and jump encourage them to do it outside or where there is cushion to fall on. I agree that children do not need to color in a predesigned picture but it does have to be within guidelines. I have3 done pictures with hands, foot and thumbs, inside and outside.
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