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posts about #learningtheropes more → City Schools Need More Sports Opportunities For Girls
New York, 7:08 AM
Thu Dec 17
63 posts in the last 24 hours
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City Schools Need More Sports Opportunities For Girls |
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03/22/09
The big problem I had was before high school, when they would arrange the team sports for us. But no one ever explained the rules to me. They assumed I knew because my father would watch all the games on Sunday and explain it to me, but my father never watched sports and didn't know any of these games any better than I did. So I would do something I wasn't supposed to do, like pick up a ball between plays or something, and they would yell at me and call me stupid but never ever explain what I did or what I was supposed to be doing. THAT'S when I gave up on all sports, ever.
Now I do yoga once a week, and I can guarantee you that my whole life would have been very different if this had ever been an option to me in high school.
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This is me. This is also why I tend to only stick to solitary exercise which doesn't require much grace, like spinning and weights.
03/22/09
In an era when schools can't afford BOOKS, why should sports be a priority at schools? Shouldn't book-learnin' be a school's focus?
It drives me nuts when I see all the money poured into college sports, as well. I couldn't afford a degree, but there's money to piss away on a GAME? Am I nuts here?
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I don't necessarily think that team sports are the only way to do this, but teachings kids basic fitness skills is part of teaching the whole child.
03/22/09
College athletes don't get educated at DivI schools. If they subsequently don't get into professional sports, or have a career-ending injury (which many of them do!), they have.... nothing. A piece of paper that means literally nothing more than a high school equivalency. The era of the true scholar-athlete is over and that's very, very sad to me.
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On a high school level, there is some evidence that students who play sports are more likely to stay in school. It is a huge incentive to some people to have that team - they're willing to slog through classes in order to participate.
Also, I think there are many "intelligences." Schools should nurture all of them, including sports.
03/22/09
Also, playing sports provides an academic incentive for many of my students. I had a special needs student struggling extremely hard in my class that busted his ass to get a passing grade in order to play football. If he wasn't required to maintain a minimum G.P.A. in order to play sports, I don't know that he would have worked as hard as he did.
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I went to an accredited college and if you missed more than I think 3 classes in a semester you FAILED automatically.
Is it all just for show that these athletes "learn" at school?
03/22/09
Academics is paramount. But sports provide enrichment. So do things like art, computers, libraries, drama, and whatever else kids can get interested in.
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If parents are working multiple jobs or aren't around for whatever reasons, schools need to step in and make up the gaps sometimes. Sports is one of the ways of doing this. Also, the more time kids are playing sports, the less time they're left to their own devices. Which in middle school/high school, is oftentimes of a good thing.
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Unfortunately, most of the girls on my suburbia sports teams didn't learn this either. I think it's universal.
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And we had to fight for every dime. It was ridiculous.
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Also, Ultimate is a great option for girls if they have the field space. I find that Ultimate is especially good because of the self-officiating nature of the sport. What other sport relies on the sportsmanlike behavior of its players to regulate play on the field, with no outside referee? It is simply assumed that we will all play by the rules, play fairly, and treat the other team with respect. It's a great thing on the field, and I find that it extends off the field with most Ultimate players.
Also, even co-ed Ultimate is good at incorporating girls. I've never played in a co-ed game where the guys didn't 'let' the girls play.
03/22/09
Most of my high school PE seemed to involve standing around and being bored in team sports, where the athletic boys basically just took over the ball for the whole period. I was very physically active in high school, but only on my own time - going for walks, doing step aerobics when it was too cold to ride bikes, etc. I'm not fast or coordinated, never have been, and there was really no way for me to get involved in team sports. PE was a boring, stinky hour of yawning and occasional humiliation.
To this day I don't have much interest in team sports - participating, watching, anything. PE just made it seem kind of thuggish and repetitive. If there are more opportunities for students to get active and enjoy exercise, I'm all for it.
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Nowadays I play Ultimate, as I said below. I won't call myself un-athletic anymore. I might not be the strongest player on any given team, but I get a few decent handblocks in at every tournament, and I can catch most discs that come at me. I've played every point of a tournament in DC summer heat, and ran the whole time. I'm not nonathletic at all.
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I will add that at my high school we could choose between regular P.E. which was usually sex-segregated, or we could take weightlifting, or dance. I took weightlifting because the dance teacher hated people who had previous dance experience, and for one semester I was the only girl in weightlifting. It was a great time because I was allowed to do the lifting MWF and on Tues and Thurs when the guys were playing basketball, I was allowed to sit on the bench and do my Algebra II homework. The second semester three other more athletic girls joined and I was no longer allowed to do what I wanted, but was expected to stand around and watch the guys. I appealed to my teacher who told me he didn't mind if I sat on the bench as long as I walked border of the gym once.
Middle school PE was the nightmare where all the guys took the soccer ball and turned the game into football, or they never passed the basketball. No one stopped them either because "boys will be boys."
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In our last year we could actually pick some cool stuff, like self-defense, capoeira, salsa and rock climbing. I understand that that would probably be too expensive to introduce for all grades, but still, it was fun.
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I love martial arts, and think I'd probably be fairly good at them if I ever got around to it. Capoeira is just so freaking beautiful.
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@baraqiel: I think they make you take a psych evaluation before you can become a gym teacher and if they can't tick the 'sadist' box you can't become one.
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But reading the rest of the comments, it sounds as though this gym teacher wasn't such a rogue after all!
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I can turn like a champ, though. It serves me well during recess duty.