“Pumping Up the Brain”

“Pumping Up the Brain”

A new research has shown a link between exercise and education. The research claims that exercise help brains cells grow and create the right chemistry.  DR. John Ratey, professor of Psychiatry at Harvard medical school is the author of a new book called “SPARK” in which he examines the effect   of exercise to the learning ability and how our brains change when we exercise. His research has shown that exercise help the cells to live longer and work better. At Naperville Central High school, Illinois, they have started at project to make P.E. the way to make a better grade and smarter students. Maxyne Kozil is a reading teacher at the high school and she’s a big fan of the idea, she tell the journalist how that seems completely logic to her, that exercise helps for a faster learning. “I feel more awake” that’s how Dominic Traver describes himself after a running trip and not completely worn out.  

Debbye Turner Bell is ending the show by saying that maybe this could put the P.E. classes back in the high schools

In a standard school class every 6. Student is suffering from obesity!

When George W. Bush in 2001 signed the NCLB or “No Child left behind” it seemed like a great idea. It had the potential to close the massive gab between the children in public schools, the gab made by the smart rich kids and the not so smart kids from the lower classes of society. An Act that put a standard on the education all over the States.  In a simplified way of telling, if one child is behind the schedule, more focus is put on that child to help him get back to the rest of the class. The only flaw in the plan was the economy, because more focus on one child means more hours of work for a teacher, and more hours mean more money, more money means a higher bill to the government. When the government got that bill, they said that to the schools, they need to get some of the money from somewhere else.

Where do you take money from a school without slacking on the technical level? That’s a simple question to answer! From the P.E. classes of course, cause why spend time in school running around when you can do that at home? I don’t see any problems there? Do you?

Neither did the government and the schools.  At least not in the first few years, but now the problem is extremely difficult to miss. In the Land of hopes and opportunities USA, 15 percent of children in the age 6-19 are suffering from obesity. To put than in a perspective we understand, a standard middle school class with 25 students, almost 4 of them are overweight, or every 6. Student that is pretty much in my opinion.

In a recent research from Arizona State University, it’s pointed out that exercise and P.E. Lessons actually help the brain to regrowth brain cells and make them live longer and it’s creating the right environment for the nerve system to work on full activity. The research furthermore shows a direct line between students who have P.E. lessons in school and student who attend to psychical activities in there time off.   

On the other hand NASPE is recommending 60 minutes of activities for kids in the age 5-12, and that’s a little difficult when you are forced to sit still from 8-4 every day.  Combined with the NCLB Act and an average need to sleep 8-10 hours every night. 8 hours of school + 10 hours of sleep = 18 hours without thinking of homework are probably a job. So why not spend 45-60 minutes on a school day to exercise a bit? 10 minutes here and there suddenly makes 40 minutes and then 20 minutes gym at the start of the day.  

So why don’t we just put these small activities in from time to time? There’s one simple answer to that, money.  The NCLB Act is a law and your health is your own problem. That means every time the school have to decide where to put their money, the Act comes in first line. The problem of the Act is that the Government only supports the project by 10 percent and the rest is the schools own problem. So when the entire country is suffering from obesity and the follows from it, the country is spending billions of dollars on few kids that can’t or won’t make their homework.  

                             What I think we can do: first of all, we have to change the entire mentality of the people. We live in a world where money is everything, and your look is something you can pay yourself out of. That, my friends, is wrong! We have known for centuries that your body controls your abilities to work and survive in this world. As I wrote earlier in this text, a happy brain is a happy body. You have to have a fit body to work at 100%! You don’t see any layers who suffer from obesity, why? Because they know, that they can’t think if they don’t do any psychical activities.

Over and Out.