{"id":28757,"date":"2017-10-19T16:23:54","date_gmt":"2017-10-19T21:23:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=28757"},"modified":"2017-12-01T11:55:01","modified_gmt":"2017-12-01T17:55:01","slug":"what-do-monkey-bars-and-test-scores-have-in-common-more-than-you-might-think","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2017\/10\/19\/what-do-monkey-bars-and-test-scores-have-in-common-more-than-you-might-think\/","title":{"rendered":"What Do Monkey Bars and Test Scores Have In Common? More Than You Might Think"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_28761\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 620px;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-28761\" alt=\"Fourth graders at Chattanooga Elementary School play during recess. \" src=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2017\/10\/20171019_Recess_WEB.jpg\" width=\"620\" height=\"413\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2017\/10\/20171019_Recess_WEB.jpg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2017\/10\/20171019_Recess_WEB-500x333.jpg 500w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2017\/10\/20171019_Recess_WEB-150x100.jpg 150w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/files\/2017\/10\/20171019_Recess_WEB-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Emily Wendler \/ StateImpact Oklahoma<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Fourth graders at Chattanooga Elementary School play during recess.<\/p>\n<\/div><p>On the playground at Chattanooga Elementary School some kids are pretending to be pirates, a few boys are climbing on a baseball dugout, and another group is belting out the words to various pop songs as they wriggle across the monkey bars.<\/p><p>This is the students\u2019 third 15-minute recess of the day, and they\u2019ll get one more before the end of the school day in the tiny southwestern Oklahoma town of about 450.<\/p><p>Added up: That\u2019s an hour of recess a day \u2014 double what these kids got two years ago, and double what most kids in America get.<\/p><p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=https%3A\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/347692012&color=%23ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&show_teaser=true&visual=false\" height=\"150\" width=\"100%\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p><p><!--more--><\/p><p>Chattanooga\u2019s students might seem lucky, but they\u2019re actually part of a study examining how extra recess time affects their mental and physical health \u2014 and, ultimately, the kids\u2019 academic performance.<\/p><p>Debbie Rhea, a professor and researcher at Texas Christian University, designed the study after visiting Finland, where students take a mandatory 15-minute play break every hour. Schools in Finland <a href=\"http:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/wef-ranking-of-best-school-systems-in-the-world-2016-2016-11\/#1-finland-67-11\">consistently rank among the best in the world<\/a>.<\/p><p>\u201cThey continue to cherish play in Finland,\u201d Rhea says, \u201cAnd play itself is the job of a child.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Study break<\/h3><p>Over the past few decades<a href=\"http:\/\/www.centerforpubliceducation.org\/Main-Menu\/Organizing-a-school\/Time-out-Is-recess-in-danger\"> American schools have whittled away at recess time<\/a> in order to deal with increasing demands of testing. Some schools have even<a href=\"https:\/\/www.today.com\/health\/should-elementary-schools-have-recess-some-florida-parents-fight-break-1D80423842\"> eliminated it<\/a>.<\/p><p>Chattanooga Public Schools Superintendent Jerry Brown has worried about disappearing recess for years.<\/p><p>\u201cYoung people are naturally curious,\u201d he says. \u201cThey want to learn, but to ask them to sit in their desk all day, without breaks, without giving their minds a break, is just wrong for us to do that.\u201d<\/p><p>When Brown heard about Rhea\u2019s recess study, he immediately wanted to sign his school up.<\/p><p>Now in the second year of the three-year-long study, Brown has actually taken time away from the classroom to allow more time for recess.<\/p><p>\u201cIt\u2019s a huge change in how you do things,\u201d Brown says, \u201cI think that scares people.\u201d<\/p><p>Fifth grade teacher Jackie Gable says, at first, she was scared to reduce the amount of classroom time.<\/p><p>\u201cI was not a believer,\u201d she says. \u201cI thought, \u2018How on Earth am I going to fit in what I need to get done?\u2019 Because I always struggled fitting in what I needed to get done in the day. How was I\u00a0going to do it now, with less time?\u201d<\/p><p>Gable is now a believer.<\/p><p>\u201cWe get so much more done here, because they have those breaks,\u201d she says. \u201cThey are truly focused in the classroom, so we don\u2019t lose the instructional time.\u201d<\/p><p>When StateImpact visited in October, kids seemed to have the program nailed down. They knew when their teacher\u2019s alarm went off, it was time to go play, but when their 15-minute break was over, they came back to class with no fuss, sat down quietly, and looked ready to learn again.<\/p>\n<h3>Curious change<\/h3><p>Gable says she\u2019s noticed other improvements, too. Her students are much more creative than they used to be, and they\u2019re more engaged. Prior to the recess program, she says students rarely asked questions in class. Gable says students now seem more curious.<\/p><p>\u201cThey\u2019re starting to piece together things that they\u2019ve learned,\u201d she says. \u201cIn a way I feel like their minds are really open.\u201d<\/p><p>Sixth grade teacher Jessica Cassell also sees a dramatic change in her students.<\/p><p>\u201cWhen we first started this last year they didn\u2019t know how to play. To use their imagination, that was hard for them,\u201d she says. \u201cNow I see constant laughter and they\u2019re coming up with different games to play every day.\u201d<\/p><p>Part of the program at Chattanooga Elementary includes a 15-minute daily class on positive behavior, which second grade teacher Heather McElhaney says has led to less tattling.<\/p><p>\u201cYou don\u2019t see as many of the kids coming to us, having us have to solve a problem for them,\u201d she says. \u00a0\u201cThey are learning to [do] conflict resolution themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Brain games<\/h3><p>Rhea, the researcher, is conducting the study in 20 schools \u2014 19 of which are in Texas. The Texas schools have shown a 2 to 3 percent increase in students\u2019 math and reading scores. Due to Oklahoma\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2017\/10\/11\/education-leaders-say-drop-in-state-test-scores-due-to-tougher-grading-system-not-poor-performance\/\">new tests and grading guidelines<\/a>, she says it\u2019s too early to evaluate the program\u2019s effectiveness.<\/p><p>Beyond grades and test scores, however, Rhea says the recess program\u2019s results are consistent across all schools.<\/p><p>\u201cWe always see somewhere between 28 and 30 percent decrease in off-task behaviors, which defines as fidgeting, moving around the room, or staring off into space,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd disruptive and aggressive behaviors are almost not seen at all anymore.\u201d<\/p><p>Playing outside triggers positive feedback from the prefrontal cortex of childrens\u2019 brains, Rhea says.<\/p><p>&#8220;It puts them in a parasympathetic nervous response, which is a relaxed response,\u201d she says, \u201cAnd it creates thousands of new highways in their brains.\u201d<\/p><p>Superintendent Brown says with or without a change in academic scores, he\u2019s already seen enough evidence to know it\u2019s the right thing to do.<\/p><p>\u201cIn education we have to start thinking more about the whole child,\u201d he said.<\/p><p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On the playground at Chattanooga Elementary School some kids are pretending to be pirates, a few boys are climbing on a baseball dugout, and another group is belting out the words to various pop songs as they wriggle across the monkey bars.This is the students\u2019 third 15-minute recess of the day, and they\u2019ll get one [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[855,734],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28757"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28757"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28757\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28891,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28757\/revisions\/28891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}