Cutting recess time worrisome

Change hurts sometimes. And when it comes against the time-honored tradition of recess, it seems all the more painful. This school year, a new schedule for all elementary schools in Greeley-Evans School District 6 calls for just one recess in the first- through fifth-grades. The recess will be midday in a 40-minute block with lunch. Students in all-day kindergarten will have an additional afternoon recess.

For some schools, this is not much of a change. But for others it is, and the idea of a shorter recess time has angered some parents.

"Anybody with kids and a brain knows that kids cannot sit still that long, especially boys," said Brad Laue, whose son is a third-grader in District 6.

Yet the school district has good rationale for this tough change.

An audit of the district found it to be "fragmented" and "inconsistent." These problems of inconsistency were districtwide: From what was being taught in the classroom to when teachers decided to give recess.

Kathi VanSoest, director of priority schools for District 6, said when she was a substitute principal at an elementary school, she asked to see a school schedule. What she received was a notebook full of papers with schedules hand-written by teachers.

A group of administrators and teachers sat down last year to fix the problem. What they produced was a common school schedule where teachers across the district teach the same thing at the same time for the same amount of time. Also a part of that common schedule is one recess during the school day, though teachers are encouraged to get their kids active in the classroom.

A common schedule, along with the new aligned curriculum, was desperately needed in District 6.

That said, however, we do have concerns about recess time being cut. The National Association for Sport and Physical Education recommends that students get a minimum of 60 minutes a day of physical activity. A 40-minute combined recess and lunch and 50 minutes of physical education class once a week is far from meeting that recommendation.

Even though the schedule rotates, so sometimes students will get P.E. twice a week, it is still not enough to curb the problems of inactivity and obesity.

It is an epidemic that is growing. Nationally, twice as many children and teens were overweight in 2000 as in 1980.

Recess is a great way for kids to get some much-needed exercise and now some students may be getting less of it. We're worried.

This problem does have an easy solution however: parents.

Ultimately, it is their responsibility to make sure their children are getting the exercise they need. Society shouldn't rely just on schools. Parents need to make sure their kids are outside playing and participating in physical activities when they aren't in school.

Ultimately, parents are the ones who will make the biggest difference in the health of their child.