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Girls’ running club offers much more than exercise

Originally published March 23, 2019 in the Westerly Sun.

By Cynthia Drummond

Twice a week, students in Grades 3 and 4 at Ashaway Elementary School meet after school for 90 minutes in the gymnasium. What makes this after-school club different is that the members are all girls.

Health and physical education teacher Jackie Sorensen brought the Girls on the Run program with her when she moved to Rhode Island from San Diego in 2016. The program is designed by Girls on the Run International, a girls’ empowerment organization based in North Carolina. Read More

PE assessment software
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PE Assessment Software Enables Students to Manage Key SEL Skills

Teacher Develops Metrics to Assess Students on Key Behaviors and Build on Relationship Between Fitness, Academic Success

A creative teacher uses PE assessment software to develop a platform to help students improve their social and emotional wellness by reinforcing positive performance and proactively meeting with students when issues arise.

Mitchell Middle School (South Dakota) teacher Cheryl Miller added IHT Zone wrist heart rate monitors to her curriculum, but she wanted to do more than measure each students’ physical growth during the year. Taking a big picture approach to overall health, she also wanted a way to help students see ways they could improve themselves behaviorally as well. Read More

wellness management
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PE Class Connects Fitness to Social-Emotional Wellness Management

Peers Honor Hamburg Area High School’s Donine Kelly as a ‘Visionary Leader’ Among PE Teachers For Focus on Both Physical, Emotional Wellness

Two years ago, Hamburg Area (Penn.) High School’s Donine Kelly changed the emphasis of her physical education curriculum from sports to fitness and wellness. Instead of teaching students how to play specific games, her curriculum, honored recently with regional awards, focuses on the tools students need to properly manage their overall wellness, placing the same importance on the social wellness as physical.

“Our goal is to not only improve their fitness levels, but also improve their overall wellness,” Kelly said.  “We have moved away from the traditional, old school, team-based sports model and moved towards a more lifetime, fitness-based model that really addresses all of the spheres of wellness — mental, emotional, social, physical and spiritual.” Read More

SEL
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MA State PE Association Measures Student SEL Progress

With its Board of Education focusing on Social-Emotional Learning, SEL, across the Commonwealth, Massachusetts physical education teachers now have a way to quantify how students master those essential skills.

SEL
Students enjoy a pleasant conversation during PE class at Indian Springs Elementary (Texas).

IHT and the Massachusetts Association of Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance (MAHPERD) have integrated SEL protocols into IHT’s Spirit Assessment Measures software. Teachers at 79 participating schools can now assess how students master SEL skills and report the results of those assessments to state leaders, including MAHPERD Executive Director Maria Melchionda. Read More