No Running in School?

Most of the top athletes started running early in life. Just look at the
Kenyans -- they used to run to school and back, sometimes 6 miles there and
back. So, yes the earlier you start exercising in life the better-- you
create the habit, and the chances you'll suffer from obesity problems later
are severely reduced.
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No Running in School?
Copyright (c) 2006 The Brain Code LLC

Dodge ball was out years ago because of it's dangerous
nature. Now some schools in Wyoming, Washington, Oregon,
California and South Carolina have banned tag, soccer and
touch football. Just this week some Massachusetts schools
added themselves to the game-banning list, citing a broader
rule against "hitting and inappropriate touching" ­ WHAT???

A recent article published in USA Today explains how a
trend is developing across the country limiting kid's
physical activity in schools. Many districts are banning
more and more games in PE and on recess.

Another class bites the dust

To make matters worse many middle schools and high schools
are cutting PE from the full year curriculum. ‘The Shape of
the Nation' report, released about a month ago, concluded
that most states are failing to provide student's with
adequate physical education. The report showed that the
number of students attending a daily PE class is down to
28%! Does this have anything to do with the fact the 1 out
of 5 school age kids today are overweight? Along with
horrible diets of most kids, the lack of sufficient
physical activity is a huge part of the problem.

Many schools cite the need for more academic class time in
order to meet the requirements of national testing
standards. The irony of it is that cutting PE programs is
actually making our student's test performance worse. A
large Canadian study looked at the academic performance of
kids split into two groups. One group received one hour of
PE class with moderate physical activity during the course
of the day, while the other group had academic instruction
for that hour.

At the end of the year, the group of kids that had PE
outperformed the other group in academic classes for every
grade tested. This was true even though the non-PE group
received about 15% more classroom instruction time. So does
it make sense to cut PE from our schools?

Physical activity is proven to increase attention, improve
learning and improve memory. These are all attributes that
help kids become better students. Yet our schools continue
to cut PE from their curriculum. We must put greater value
on physical activity in the school system and find a way to
support it.

Sweat or Stress

As the Canadian study suggests, physical activity can
actually make you smarter. Not only that, but exercise can
help prevent disorders like Alzheimer's disease,
Parkinson's disease and depression. It can even increase
your chances of recovering from a stroke or traumatic brain
injury.

Exercise causes a rise in several growth factors in the
brain that are responsible for helping brain cells survive
and divide into new brain cells, or neurons. One of the
brain areas producing new neurons is the hippocampus. The
hippocampus plays a critical role in learning, memory and
attention. Exercise helps new neurons grow in the
hippocampus, which helps improve performance on several
types of cognitive tasks.

Another important role of the hippocampus is in the
response to stress. In fact, studies show that a smaller
hippocampus is associated with anxiety disorders and
depression. Stress can damage the hippocampus and cause
neurons to die, the opposite of what happens when you
exercise.

Folks that exercise regularly know that they are much more
capable of handling stress throughout their day than they
are when they don't exercise. This is, in part, because
exercise and stress have opposite effects on the
hippocampus and exercise improves your ‘buffer' to handle
the stress.

Interestingly, anti-depressants work in a similar way.
Although, we don't completely understand the exact
mechanism of anti-depressant action, we do know that
several classes of anti-depressants increase new neurons in
the hippocampus. They do the same thing that exercise does!

Like exercise, anti-depressants also induce new neuron
growth in the hippocampus. Psychiatrists have known for a
long time that patients experiencing depression respond
much better to therapy if they combine it with regular
exercise. In some cases, exercise alone is sufficient to
alleviate depressive symptoms. Personally, I'd rather see
doctors try a prescription for more physical activity and a
better diet before they send you to the pharmacist.

How fast is your Brain Aging?

Studies also show that exercise protects the brain from
aging and injury. Older adults that regularly exercise
perform better in cognitive tasks and have lower rates of
Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. They also recover
stronger from strokes and from accidental brain injury.

One can argue that people who exercise have many factors in
their lives that can contribute to these findings. For
example, they smoke less, eat better, etc. However, studies
in laboratory animals support the idea that exercise alone
is protective. Animals that are exercised are protected
against traumatic brain injury in laboratory tests and
don't develop the extent of Alzheimer's and Parkinson's
disease in model systems.

Studies also show that in addition to exercise's protective
role, it is a valuable therapeutic tool for brain function.
Fitness training improves cognitive functions relative to
planning, scheduling, task coordination and attention.
Adults that exercise have more grey matter, representing
more brain cells, than adults that don't exercise.

We know that on average, adults tend to maintain the
lifestyle values that they had as kids. So does it make
sense to stand bye and watch schools cut PE and
heart-pumping recess activities?

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Dr. Simon Evans is a neuroscientist at the University of
Michigan and a nationally licensed youth sports coach. Are
your kids getting everything they need to reach their
potential? What barriers are holding your family back? Find
out at Dr. Evans website at http://www.thebraincode.com

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This is a bigger problem in the USA, but here in the UK obesity problems
amongst children are increasing. There is a drive though from schools to
get more kids to eat healthier foods, and its more and more common for junk
food to be banned at school. Children, like their parents, probably don't
get enough exercise though.