Reply to Did your FCPS ES have outdoor recess today?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]It’s crazy that so many parents just accept that FCPS holds indoor recess day after day this winter. Kids need exercise and socialization that comes with physical activity, not more screen time at school. Are that many parents not paying attention to all the research the last 10 years?

Kids and schools in other parts of the country somehow manage to go outside. It’s only 30 minutes, kids can seriously deal with some wet socks for a few hours, plus maybe next time they can wear boots. Why do we accept FCPS making every decision based on the lowest common denominator?  Is the plan for indoor recess the entire month of January? 
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Schools here dont have capacity for kids to carry boots and change in and out of them. Sitting for hours in wet socks while trying to learn is unacceptable. I love fresh air and take my kids out as often as possible (yes even this week) but even I can understand that school cant be responsible for this.

Also indoor recess does not equal screens at our school. They play board games and stuff like that.[/quote]

What in earth are you talking about...they don't have the capacity?!?  The classrooms in the FCPS building where I teach are all FAR bigger than my ES where I grew up in CT.  You figure it out. You clear off a table and spread out the hats and gloves to dry.   Also, I don't ever remember changing boots at school, never, and we had a LOT of snow.  You go to school in boots and you stay at school in boots.

You don't die from a couple of hours in damp socks and with damp jeans.  If a kid is really uncomfortable, the school could keep some old clean socks in the school clothes closet (most schools have one for kids who vomit and have accidents) for kids who complain.

What is REALLY happening here is principals are terrified of parents and don't want to put ANY responsibility on them.  I'm old, comparatively, as a teacher, so I have no gestation telling a young parent, "You need to dress your son more warmly in January.  Maybe pack a clean pair of socks in his backpack because he tends to play hard and get his socks wet.  If you need help getting more warm clothing for him, let me know and our social worker can arrange for some for your family."

It's not hard but it's like we are SO terrified of parents that we don't even try to coach them to be better parents anymore.  We just keep coddling the kids more and more, to the detriment of everyone.

Frankly, I've never observed that an afternoon of instruction was lost to wet socks. Ever.  And I have taught since 1994 both here and in two New England states.   But I have definitely lost an entire afternoon of instruction - actually, FIVE afternoons last week - to a huge class of stir crazy, antsy kids, a lot of which have unmedicated ADHD, ALL of whom need to go out and run like puppies, unrestrained, in the snow so that they can get some exercise, space, and air and come back and focus and learn.  Instead, we just bumped into each other and stayed up in each other's spaces and feelings for an uncomfortable 30 minutes of screens and games and tried in vain to get anything useful done.

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