I liked gym class when I was in school. Loved playing basketball and climbing the rope. When I got to HS, I got to pick weight training class as an option and enjoyed that. But I know some people who felt like it was akin to being a witness for the defense with a hostile D.A. and jury. Just torture for them.

Should P.E. be a "required" course in school?

Thoughts?

I liked the pathetic attempt at one that mine was. I am torn on whether or not it should be required. I guess it depends.

P.E. was cool. I don't like to run, but I liked playing volleyball and I liked being in the weight room. I remember in my school...there two P.E. classes held at the same time, in the same gym by two different instructors. On one side was the female softball coach and gym teach and the other side was the boys varsity and junior varsity football coach. I was in the football coach's class and I enjoyed it. He made us run, we did weight training, played basketball and whole nine while the kids in the female coach's class barely did shit. They would sit and watch us work out most of the time and sometimes they would come out to the track and run with us but trust....she didn't make them do much. Which wasn't surprising since she was big as hell and it was pretty ironic having her as a P.E. instructor and she wasn't in the best of shape. In any case, I think P.E. should definitely be a required course. Give kids some incentive to exercise and get active or do something. It was required at my school to graduate and hell, you had four years to pass the beginner's course. You didn't have to take advanced P.E. classes if you didn't want to.

What do you mean by required? Required as in the school has to have it or required as in you have to pass it to graduate? Because a lot of schools have it but you don't have to actually do anything, you just show up and that's good enough for them to take to graduation.

Too many kids are inactive. PE may be the only sort of physical activity they get. It needs to be a required course.

I loved it. Where I live... actually - I think it's the whole process - daily PE in mandatory. Kids are required to have at least 30 minutes of PE every school day. It's part of the healthy schools initiative, which included changing all vending machines so that there are only healthier choices - no pop, all choices meeting certain requirements, and so on

Impact wrote:

Too many kids are inactive. PE may be the only sort of physical activity they get. It needs to be a required course.

If they can make it a good course, I'd say require it. But I've encountered poorly done ones that shouldn't be required. Although for some kids, it's just an excuse to finally get out of the stuffy classroom and good off, and not physical activity. I also don't like gym class containing organized sports. xD

Impact wrote:

Too many kids are inactive. PE may be the only sort of physical activity they get. It needs to be a required course.

If they can make it a good course, I'd say require it. But I've encountered poorly done ones that shouldn't be required. Although for some kids, it's just an excuse to finally get out of the stuffy classroom and good off, and not physical activity. I also don't like gym class containing organized sports. xD

I loathed phys ed. I don't think it should be mandatory; all it does is make the physically awkward an even bigger target to laugh at.

Too many PE classes are about an hour of generic ball playing. At least that's how it was when I was in school. I liked it, but it's hardly educational to anyone who couldn't care less about sports. It should be mandatory, but instead of generic games of indoor volleyball, baseball and basketball, make it a weight lifting class, or something that actually teaches the properties of physical fitness.

It should be an elective. I hated gym class in school and got absolutely nothing out of it.