Recess Temperatures

[zoom-zoom]

You would think they'd understand shrinkage by this time.

Perhaps this is a way to avoid embarrassing "tenting" at school.

[Kathi]

This discussion of whether or not a kid chooses to wear layers has me laughing. I was always the kid who wore her coat, hat, gloves and scarf--if anything, I was often overdressed. I still love my layers! My sister, on the other hand, would often go to the bus stop (before I started driving her to school) with no coat, or buy coats that are really not suited for the weather. During her high school career, her winter coat of choice was a lighter (but fashionable) wool-blend thing. Mine was a Lands' End Squall jacket.

My elementary school (in Cincinnati) had a "must be above freezing and no snow" rule. I thought it was silly. I still think it's silly.

Did you go to a Cincinnati Public School? I grew up in western Hamilton county (Cincinnati area) in the 50's. Regardless of the weather we walked to the main highway to catch our school bus. No matter how miserable the weather Mom did not drive us to the bus stop and I remember being really cold, hot waiting for those school buses. The only days we were inside at school was when there was snow on the ground or it was raining. I remember snuggling up to a corner of the school building for warmth on chilly, windy days. In the winter, we bundled up in layers, wool and cotton and went out to play every day after school. On snowy days we got our hats, socks and gloves wet, went in and dried them out and went out and played in the snow some more.

As an adult I ski 3-4 days a week and I especially love the snowy days when other skiers are bailing because it's too "snowy". I do dress in my "high tech" layers to stay warm on lift chairs but rarely get cold or need to go in for a warm up.

When I was teaching I thought the temp rule was silly because the kids weren't dressed by our adult standards. Many of these kids were latchkey kids who had no opportunity to go outside once they got home. They needed physical exercise every day. The excuse of no hats and gloves was lame too. Our lost and found boxes were full of hats, gloves, jackets and coats that no parent or child bothered to claim. At the end of the school year they were washed and donated to charity.

I agree that we are coddling our children too much and are encouraging the rise of obesity in our youth.

The weather in Missouri isn't all that different than Southwestern Ohio. The kids need to be outside every opportunity they can get, even if it's only for a few minutes.

[OakLeaf]

"everyone gets a trophy for just showing up"

Well that sounds an awful lot like "finishers' medals."

[Crankin]

V, this is kind of related to your relating the bathroom issues for teachers. Although I finally started just leaving my kids for a couple of minutes to pee (easier in middle school and I always told the teacher next door), I recently had to do an all day urine collection test in preparation as part of preparatory lab work to get Reclast. I didn't want to give up a Sunday of riding or skiing, hiking, etc., so I did it on Thanksgiving day while I cooked, went for a short ride, and ate my dinner.
The endocrinologist called me personally, because she didn't believe that the sample I turned in was "right." She questioned if I had understood the directions to go in the collection bottle for 24 hours. I replied, that yes, I understood, but that after 30 years as a teacher and training myself not to have to pee too often, it's hard to change!
She believed me right away, after that and told me to double my water intake.

[tc1]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/15/wo...%20cold&st=cse

[shootingstar]

I just meant that we coddle our children so much these days that they don't get to *experience* things like they should (like being uncomfortable, failure, heartbreak, etc). You know: the "everyone gets a trophy for just showing up" and the "we're all the best so everyone gets to be on the honor roll" kind of stuff. Experiencing failure is a good thing, so is being uncomfortable and let down. I teach some kids that I fear will have a major meltdown in college when they realize that they aren't the only special ones in the world and that sometimes you try hard and still come up short and fail because they have never had that experience. Ya know?

And yes, V, I agree with everything you said. I think you see it differently when you teach. Choice is good, but sometimes what you say goes because you're the parent and that's the way it is.

+1. There are safe ways for children to experience things like slight discomfort when it's rainy, snowy, etc. in ways that the child is supported by adults in the background with proper clothing and gradual acclimatization.

As an older child and teen, I never thought my parents were being overly hard on me for shovelling snow..or chopping the ice that clogged up a driveway. (a worser, ickier job) it was just another boring task to do, made only easier if the snow was gently and magically falling at night without a wind. And the thing was if the parent makes a super big deal about something uncomfortable/unjust on behalf for the child (when really sometimes a situation wasn't unjust/uncomfortable for child), then the child might just acquiesce and go along with the parent, not knowing any better or take the easier way out.

I meant shovelling the snow several times per wk. each winter. It wasn't occasional.

Thx, for the New Delhi article, tc1. It is what one's body is used to.
In Canada and the U.S. , there are lots of opportunities to become gradually acclimatized to cold weather. Which is the value of having autumn weather.

Though I wore my coat, etc. because I really wanted to, in my rebellious years I used to wear open toed walking sandals to near freezing temperaures in my 20's. I absolutely cannot do that any more!

[Jolt]

Holy crap. Kids are definitely being turned into a bunch of wimps. I was in elementary school in the early '90s and never remember being kept inside due to cold temperatures (grades K-2 in Virginia, 3-5 in Massachusetts). At my school in Westwood, MA we also were outside in the mornings after arriving on the bus, until the actual start of school. The only times I recall being inside (in the cafeteria) is if it was raining, not if it was cold out. We just made sure to have warm clothing and snow boots when needed, and had fun playing until it was time to go in. We also had TWO recesses--one 15-minute morning one, and a half-hour one after lunch. I wonder if that school still does...probably not. On a related subject, who else has noticed that now the school buses stop at every kid's house to pick up/drop off rather than having just one bus stop for each neighborhood? Or is that just around here? It drives me crazy--holds up traffic bigtime, definitely not environmentally friendly b/c of all the idling and slow driving it creates (at a time when one would think that would be a consideration), and since when can kids not walk a block or two to the bus stop? Especially when we need to be helping them get MORE physical activity, most definitely not less!!

[OakLeaf]

Weeeeellll, I don't think kids should be walking on roads with no sidewalks, to wait in someone else's lane or yard. It's unnerving enough for me, as an adult, to run on rural roads. I wouldn't walk my dogs on the road leashed, when I had dogs, and if I had kids I certainly wouldn't allow them to walk in it. To me, that's a completely different issue from whether they go outside at recess, and whether their parents have to drive them a quarter mile (or less) down the lane and sit with their cars idling until the bus gets there.

[Jolt]

Weeeeellll, I don't think kids should be walking on roads with no sidewalks, to wait in someone else's lane or yard. It's unnerving enough for me, as an adult, to run on rural roads. I wouldn't walk my dogs on the road leashed, when I had dogs, and if I had kids I certainly wouldn't allow them to walk in it. To me, that's a completely different issue from whether they go outside at recess, and whether their parents have to drive them a quarter mile (or less) down the lane and sit with their cars idling until the bus gets there.

You bring up a valid point about roads without sidewalks, but the thing is that some of the places where I've seen this had perfectly good sidewalks. That's when it's really ridiculous.

[Tri Girl]

Don't you kinda think we're all becoming spoiled rotten candy a*#@s who are all a bit wimpy. Think of what our ancestors of 100+ years ago would say to us if we could talk to them right now. They lived without electricity, air conditioning (or heating for that matter), fast transportation (unless a buggy was fast), telephones, internet, etc etc.
I suppose the longer we're on this planet and the more technology we have- the wimpier we ALL get.
I'm glad I was born in this era- I don't think I would have lasted a week in the 17 or 1800's.

[Jolt]

Don't you kinda think we're all becoming spoiled rotten candy a*#@s who are all a bit wimpy. Think of what our ancestors of 100+ years ago would say to us if we could talk to them right now. They lived without electricity, air conditioning (or heating for that matter), fast transportation (unless a buggy was fast), telephones, internet, etc etc.
I suppose the longer we're on this planet and the more technology we have- the wimpier we ALL get.

I completely agree! And even now, many other people in the world still live without those things--and yet we're the ones who complain the most when things don't go the way we want them to, while the people in some of the poorest countries often seem to have the best attitudes. Not to say that all our technology etc. doesn't have some major benefits--it does (better medical care etc. for example) and it's just plain nice to have. However, it has the down side that it allows us to be wimps and to become a really inactive society that has a lot of preventable chronic disease.

[Cataboo]

You guys are acting like it's impossible to turn off your air conditioning or turn down your heat and put a few sweaters on. I never use my air conditioning despite 90-100 degree summers & 90+% humidity around here. I don't see the point in spending a couple hundred a month on electricity for air conditioning. I see the point in my pipes not freezing for heating though. I've lived in various places that were impossible to heat and I just made sure to have a ton of clothing layers on and several down blankets on the bed.

Yes, it is impossible to do without my internet access.

I can't really remember what temperatures we were allowed outside in for recess when I was young, but I'm fairly certain the standards weren't so hardcore in Virginia. We had a great big gymnasium, and I know there were days that we had recess in the gym playing dodgeball, playing with a big huge parachute, gymnastics, rhymthic gymnastics, and square dancing. I still had a lot of fun. As far as I know, I am not a fragile lily because of my time spent indoors.

middle school - we had to change into these ridiculous shorts & t shirts for gym and we didn't go outside if it was cold - we played basketball, line danced, did gymnastics or wrestled.

High school - we only had to take 2 years of gym, I think. We all severely disliked one gym teacher because he used to force us to go out and run laps when it was cold (those shorts & t shirt gym uniforms were not very warm) But otherwise, we did a lot of indoor sports in the gyms when it got cold.


If you've got a big indoor gym with lots of active things for kids to be doing... I really don't see anything wrong with indoor recess when it's cold or wet.

[OakLeaf]

In my area, public elementary schools aren't built with gyms any more (unless they're multi-use buildings, in which case recess would probably be too close to lunchtime to be able to get all the tables removed and set up again). There's no more PE in the schools (and league athletics are pay-to-play).

Not sure what it has to do with this thread - but doing without AC in high humidity means doing away with carpeting and draperies (and possibly even drywall). That's fine if you're building a new house or moving into an existing one that was built with high humidity in mind, but not even remotely an option for someone who can't afford their electric bills. We hadn't been in our house a year when Charley/Jeanne/Francis/Ivan hit, and didn't understand this. Oh, man, do I regret replacing the damaged carpet with new carpet.

[Veronica]

If you've got a big indoor gym with lots of active things for kids to be doing... I really don't see anything wrong with indoor recess when it's cold or wet.

What is a gym? New public elemantary schools aren't built with them.

All of you have no concept of being "on" for four and a half hours. Imagine you are a lifeguard and you must watch the pool for four and a ahlf hours without a break.

Having been a lifeguard I can tell you that being an elementay teacher requires much the same vigilance.

Veronica

[Cataboo]

We had a dual purpose cafeteria/gym/auditorium. I guess the teachers and the lunch room personal were fast at folding up the tables & putting them back, because they would still manage to have lunch & recess in the gym/cafeteria.

But I was 5, I didn't really pay attention to what magical things that the school did so that we could have recess indoors. I just know we did have it on occasion and we still had fun and ran around a ton. And it was a welcome diversion from the usual recess "game" where the guys would chase girls and then cage them up in the jungle gyms and not let them out once they caught them. And then we'd lead other girls to rescue the caged girls.

We also somehow managed to rehearse for class skits or whatever we did in the same area. Maybe we were a small school, I think there was probably at least 4-6 classes of kids for each grade level with 20-30 kids in a class.

As for carpetting, drapes, drywall & humidity - guess I've always lived in houses of the right ages, 'cause I've never had problems with stuff like that. Basements can sometimes need a dehumidifier though. But I do tend to pay a lot of attention to drainage and I do make sure things dry if they get flooded, even if it requires ripping out drywall. And no, it doesn't have a huge deal to do with the thread, it was just in response to people saying we're all becoming pansy wimps because of our air conditioning, our heating, and the temps are kids are playing in recess at.

Aren't teachers still on at recess? We didn't have separate teachers that watched us at recess, all the 1st or 2nd grade kids would be brought out at once and all the teachers would would watch all of us run over a huge area.