Does your school have recess?

[Greaseball]

I hear that many public schools are not having recess anymore; that they consider it a waste of time. I personally think if a child is not able to run around outside when necessary, they will just have their own recess in the classroom, disrupting everything.

I guess my question was for any type of school, though.

[lilyka]

I didn't vote because i d on't hacve a child in school and I couyldn't tell you how many recesses they have but most likely just one. Where my friend taught (2nd grade) they had one 15 minute recess a day. That is all together to little in my opinion. And they wonder why som many children are diagnosed with ADD. he!! it isn't a disorder they are just freaking antsy. And who wouldn't be. recess here is an ordeal to say the least. Because of legal concerns no child can go out wihtout a coat and snow pants unless it is certain temp (which is way to warm) so they have to bundle them up as well as store the clothing at the school. No te mention even though it is 50* (Warm here) kids aree still forced to wear snow pants outside. what a mess. There can't be much time left to play.

[Mallory]

I don't personally know of any schools that don't have recess.

But for a while I used to teach at a private school and be a parent helper in my 1 st grade brothers class. They put in a new playground that had boxes painted along the wall for kids to sit in who were "bad" and had to miss recess (I know a pretty commom punishment )

I always thought it would make things even worse for the teacher. The class I taught had about 12 kids from 5-12 in it. When ever someone was really having a hard time sitting and doing their work one of my greatest "tricks" was to send them outside with an older child(usually at least one of our classes was out side all the time, I didn't send them out alone) to run around the yard 3 times or weed the garden for 5 min. I can't imagine making them sit still for even longer.

[Kelly71]

I voted no, but only because I teach in a middle school. Some of the 6th graders get to go outside for 15-20 minutes, but by 8th grade there is nothing worked into their schedule.

[EFmom]

The elementary schools in our district do have recess--I think it's about 30 minutes.

[BusyMommy]

All grades have a lunch recess. By the time they're dressedin snow gear and lined up quietly, they're outside about 15-20mins.

Afternoon recess is unnecessary when we have so many academic lessons.: Kinder. had to fight hard for our afternoon recess even.

[lilyka]

Well we never had rescess in middle or high school. But we alsways had the optiono of eating lunch outside.

[tnrsmom]

My ds school has a lunch recess and morning and afternoon recess. At least an hour each day.

[Greaseball]

In grade school there was a half-hour lunch followed by a half-hour recess, and then a 15-minute afternoon recess.

In middle school there was a 15-minute morning "break" that served breakfast and an hour lunch which included off-campus privileges.

In high school I had a 45-minute lunch and a 45-minute "free period" which was truly free - you could go home, rest, eat, study or whatever.

[Britishmum]

All the schools I worked in had about 15-20 mins each morning and afternoon, plus an hour at lunch. The younger children were free to go in and out as they pleased most of the time.

Much less than that and you're defeating your own aims. Children need to move in order to learn.

[teachma]

My students (public elementary school) have a 20 minute snack/recess in the morning, during which they may choose to eat, play, or do a little of each. Then they have a 20 minute lunch followed by a 30 minute recess in the afternoon. Our state has a legal requirement for recess minutes per day, and it actually depends on the age of the students and the length of the school day. (The younger the student, the more recess minutes they are legally entitled to.) Of course, private schools are exempt from these laws sometimes...You may want to check into the regulations for recess in your state education code.

[bestjob]

My daughter is in grade 3 and they have three recess periods: fifteen minutes in the morning and in the afternoon and an hour at lunchtime. They stay in for twenty minutes to eat, then spend the rest of the lunch period outside. If the weather is bad, the outside time is reduced. The teachers usually allow extra time for the children to dress in the winter, so they get most of the recess time outside.

My son is in nursery school and I chose a school that doesn't have a recess period because I make sure that he has an outside playtime every day, and we walk almost everywhere as well.

Not all children crave outside time. My children thrive on it, but the kids next door can stay inside for weeks at a time. They just don't have the same need to burn off energy outside that my family does.

[sunmountain]

My boys go outside at school if it is above 20 degrees. If they stay in they go to the gym. If it's especially nice out, they go out in the afternoon, too. But they also have free reign, to an extent, of the classroom, not a desk to be seen anywhere, except the teacher's. By the time the kids are four, they are pretty much expected to dress themselves, so this cuts down on prep time.

[member234098]

At the school I teach, we have an a.m. recess, twenty minutes, and a lunch for twenty minutes followed by a twenty minute recess.

We also have one and one half hour physical education class per week weather permitting.


My homeschooled son does an hour a day of bicycling, scootering, or team sports when his buddies are out of school.

[Iteach1st]

The school I am at now only allows us 20 minutes a day...not enough. Part of that is the reasoning (not a reasoning I agree with, btw) that these are upper middle class kids, with SAHM's (virtually all of my students have SAHM's) and that they should be playing when they get home at 2:30. We just don't have enough time in the day!
It is also hard to deal with the time out thing-there is so little a teacher can do in the way of negative consequences, that is immediate enough for the student to remember why it is they are having the consequence. I really feel it is the ones who end up sitting out of recess the most who need to have it the most! This is an ongoing discussion at my school...

[Juliacat]

When I was in elementary school, we didn't have any recess, which seems weird to me when I look back on it. But we did have an hour or so of P.E. a day, so at least we got to run around on a daily basis.

I recently substituted in a first grade classroom where the kids were punished for rowdiness by being kept in at recess. The punishment didn't work very well. :

[christymama]

My daughter gets way to many recess's She get up tp 4 a darn day! PLease someone agree thats to much. We just moved here a few months ago and I AM NOT HAPPY WITH THIS SCHOOL AT ALL!! my daughter is only in the 1st grade bored out of her mind she reads chapter books and does really well in math. She is ahead of the kids here. I think they need to get busy and not have so many darn free time!

[GoodWillHunter]

Boy, am I jealous! Our school only lets 'em out for 20 minutes once a day. THATS IT! I flipped out when I found that out, but there isn't much I can do, other than file a complaint, which I have. I mean, how can you expect the kids to sit there all day? Then they gripe about how today's kids are more sedentary than their parents were. Go figure.

[momsgotmilk4two]

No recess?! Gosh, that's awful I think I would rather homeschool than send ds to a school with no recess or just 15 min. a day. He'd have to be on ritalin in order to sit for that long: While I agree with one of the other posters that 4 recesses is probably too much, 1 or none is way too little! I think it worked well to have 2 recesses when I was in school. That is what our local schools do as well.