Gym class gets national award

Published 4:00 am Saturday, January 15, 2011

In Collin Brooks’ physical education class at Jewell Elementary School, students break a sweat and breathe hard.

They run from a climbing wall to a pile of hula hoops; they gallop and run like airplanes and sneak quietly around the gym; and they throw foam dinosaurs and monkeys in the air with gusto.

It is classes like these that have helped Brooks and the school earn a national award from the National Association for Sport and Physical Education. Jewell Elementary is one of 16 schools nationwide, and the only one in Oregon, to be named a STARS school, recognizing it for its excellence in physical education.

Earning the award wasn’t easy.

A school must meet 31 criteria to qualify; Brooks created an electronic portfolio and spent a year gathering information and ensuring his class was aligned with all state and national standards.

The criteria range from the amount of time children spend in P.E. classes each week to how well the class incorporates students with disabilities to how well the class’s units are planned.

“It was massive,” Brooks said. “It was like going to graduate school.”

Some of the criteria are out of Brooks’ hands, like student-to-teacher ratio and how much time students spend in class. Currently, kids have 80 minutes of P.E. each week, including two 30-minute sessions and a 20-minute session that’s combined with music.

But Brooks focused on the areas that depended on him.

“I have really high standards,” he said. “I thought we could align with the best in the nation.”

Brooks acknowledges that not everyone thinks of P.E. as an important part of the school day, and he’d like to change that.

“Physical education is an academic learning area, and it’s important,” he said. “That’s one of the reasons I wanted to do this. It’s hard to understand the difference between physical activity and physical education.”

Brooks sees his role as helping students aspire to lifetime activity and physical fitness, and that shows in his classes.

The award, he said, helps him see what he’s doing well — providing options for students with special needs, maximizing class time — and what he could do better. He wants to keep improving.

P.E., arts stressed

“I think a really well-rounded school is hitting kids in different areas,” Principal Bruce Reynolds said. “As we were looking at Jewell and trying to build the best environment we could, P.E. is an integral part of it, and we stress P.E. and the arts.”

At the end of each class, students gather in the middle of the gym to quickly discuss what they’ve done that day, check their heart rates, and talk about the importance of being physically active on a daily basis.

“I think the key is making P.E. an inclusive environment,” Reynolds said. “The key is having students feel comfortable to find a physical activity that they can do for the rest of their lives.”

When Reynolds goes looking for a parent or visitor to the school, he often finds them near the gym doors. They’re drawn there by the music and stay there to watch the frantic activity taking place, Reynolds said.

“They’re mesmerized by what’s going on,” he said.

Constant movement

On Thursday, from the moment the first-graders entered the gym until they returned to their classrooms, they were moving. Brooks ran his class almost in intervals, with brief periods devoted to explaining the next task and then rapid activity. Students danced to music while bouncing balls, throwing and catching foam animals, and galloped around the gym.

San Diego ceremony

In March, Brooks will travel to San Diego to get his award at the American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance Convention.

At the convention, Brooks will present some of the work he’s done at Jewell, and will hear from other physical education teachers about how they organize their classes.

Reynolds hasn’t quite figured out where to get the money to send Brooks to the convention, but said it’s important for Brooks to learn from the other teachers at the event.

And, Reynolds said, other teachers could probably learn a lot from Brooks, whom he likens to the pied piper.

“He moves a finger and the kids move that way,” he said. “There’s so much activity that it can be hard to follow.”