Author: Gerry Cernicky

Back to the Future and Beyond

Writing this essay took me back in time. It involved a jump-around process blending my thoughts on past events and imagining physical education’s future. It all began with a comment from my wife who at the time was an elementary and high school principal. It was the best of both worlds. While I was teaching I was hearing an administrator’s perspective as each year progressed. But one day she commented that PE was on the wrong track. This got my attention. What did she mean? She explained, “I want to know the numbers!” In other words, what were my measurements of success? Where was the evidence? How did I know that what I was doing was having any impact on the well-being of my students after graduating from high school? It’s these questions that continue to haunt our profession today.

In recent years, the value and quality of physical education has advanced as a result of the brain research findings and technological advances. Many of our colleagues are using this information and equipment to support their teaching. But as we all know, there are still far too many physical educators who either don’t care or are uninformed. Not surprisingly, the result is that physical education too frequently gets a bad rap from outsiders. Something is clearly missing. What can be done? To me, one key solution is to improve advocacy and to increase the sharing of information.

It all starts with professional preparation and the college experience of future teachers. I can remember that one of the classes I was required to take explained how to integrate PE with the so-called core subjects. At that time this was an idea bordering on heresy! But to make a long story short, it ended up saving my job and started a new era of respect for PE in my school that continued for the 36 years of my public school teaching career.

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What are Your 2015 PE Resolutions?

I’ve found that the best way to make New Year plans and resolutions is to think back to my last year’s resolutions. Did I stick with my resolutions or somehow seem to forget them? I start my asking my wife who is a retired principal a simple question, “Is there something you suggest for all teachers?”  Typically, she responds with the suggestion to ponder the question, “What will your students remember after they leave your school and graduate?” My wife isn’t a PE person, but she has guided me in many decisions by sharing her administrative perspective. One resolution that I used for many years was don’t tell me what you do, but show me results. Not games, nor gimmicks. Just prove to me what you do and show me the evidence.

Health and PE teachers hold the key to student success. Students should know about their body and how to take care of it, and as health or PE teachers we can help them with this. This includes using heart rate monitors, prescribing fitness regimens, teaching nutrition and doing all that we can to help our students stay healthy for a lifetime. Our role is to guide them on the path of discovery to making healthy choices, staying active, choosing to join gyms, and participating in their communities as citizens of the world. Through their behaviors our students should display an important message to the health care system.

Today, more than ever before, we can help fight the obesity dilemma and show the value of physical education. It’s our time to step on the soapbox and pound the steps of state legislators and show others what we as physical educators can do. My personal resolution is to continue to remain as an advocate for all we do as physical education teachers and explore all possible avenues to garner support. And we need to go beyond recognizing the hundreds of awesome teachers on Facebook and thousands of top notch teachers across the country: It is our job to help change the behaviors of those teachers who don’t understand what quality PE is, and others who are either lazy or don’t care.

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Summer Activities are a great time to relax, refuel and re-furbish

For most of us the school year is coming to a close. But for teachers, it’s a good time to reflect and think about what worked, what didn’t work, and the reasons for both. To get a head start for the next school term, I find it helpful to create a calendar with large space blocks to enter pertinent daily comments. Entries can include behavior issues, positive lessons, and accidents, parental concerns, or anything you think important for future use.

These entries can help remind you of past problems you can avoid and the details of events you might need in a future meeting. With the advent of smart phones and tablets, you can also easily add daily reminders and notes into an App. But, sometimes it’s also good to have a back up just in case of a technology glitch.

Before packing your bags for a much anticipated and probably needed vacation, I encourage you to plan what needs to be done to take you through the first week of teaching. Even the relaxing part of your summer activities can combine refueling and refurbishing too. For teachers, learning never stops. Observing what young people are doing helps us to better appreciate what makes our students tick, and how they’ll likely react to our teaching and the lessons we are planning to present to them.

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Sportsmanship, Character Building, & PE

Sportsmanship for me is when a guy walks off the court and you really can’t tell whether he won or lost, when he carries himself with pride either way. – Jim Courier

When I first thought about the theme for this month’s article, it struck me how much sports have changed. I wondered, “Is this change occurring in the right direction?” Simultaneously, I thought about the hodge-podge of events and activities that have transformed the direction PE has taken. I concluded that both sports and PE are at a crossroads awaiting choices we must make about our professional future.

Today, there is a host of negativity, especially in professional and college sports, towards sportsmanship. What character is really being addressed, taught, and built in sports? All too common are taunts, verbal abuse of officials, bending of the rules, individual showmanship that goes far beyond the “look at me,” pounding of chests, throat slashes, and the abrasive interviews following big games.

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How to Stay Healthy this Holiday Season

The holidays are a great time for families to get together around the dinner table to share memories and enjoy each other’s company. Only later, while slouching on the couch to decompress do the negative health consequences of our increased holiday food consumption begin nagging us. And during these moments of reflection we start to think about physical activity strategies to help us work off these extra food and drink calories. Well, it doesn’t have to be this way. Instead of waiting for these guilty feelings why not plan ahead and help others along the way?

The first step is to make a plan and then stick to it. That sounds easy but it’s going to take some navigation and guidance to proceed in the proper direction. Fortunately, help is on the way from today’s ubiquitous electronic devices and apps that are both useful and fun to use. Physical educators can be a great source of advice for teaching colleagues, families, and students in helping them to engage in appropriate health promoting activities.

To accomplish this task, it’s wise to create a plan that involves others such as family members or friends who will act as coaches and motivators to help us stay on the right path. These ideas can be posted in a blog, or shared as reminders, fitness calendars and online information web site links. Potential topics of advice could include a combination of health, exercise, nutrition, first aid and injury prevention information. As a physical education teacher, I found it to be an effective strategy to make a calendar or bulletin board to help others track their activities and healthy food choices. During the school break for the holidays, health and P.E. teachers can be a viable asset for carrying over health-promoting information into the holidays. It could be homework or simply advice. Fortunately, today there are some excellent online resources you might like to personally check out and then consider sharing.

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Preparing for the New School Year

The title of this article is one that could be deceiving until you understand what I mean, and how it should be food for thought. Preparation (for the new school year) should have started many years ago in the college years by acquiring pride in physical education, and the planning it took to become a teacher. As I regress, having retired in 2003, I can look back over many successful years and why they were successful. What made them so extraordinary?

 

 

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