Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: I'm Lorn vogel Bomb, and this is a classic episode
Speaker 1: of the podcast. Today's delves into the strange history of
Speaker 1: why we Americans have standardized tests for our middle schoolers' fitness.
Speaker 1: Of course, fitness is important to feeling good, but why
Speaker 1: the tests? Hey brain Stuff. I'm Lauren vogel Bomb, and
Speaker 1: believe it or not, I was never particularly the athletic type.
Speaker 1: I have vivid middle school memories of being administered a
Speaker 1: standardized fitness test during gym class. I don't recall ever
Speaker 1: being taught how to do pull ups or curl ups,
Speaker 1: but I sure remember being tested on how many I
Speaker 1: could do in front of my class. The Presidential Fitness
Speaker 1: Test was a battery of physical feats designed to assess
Speaker 1: the health of school age American children. The test has
Speaker 1: since been retired and replaced by the less arbitrary and
Speaker 1: more forgiving physical fitness test known as Fitness Graham, but
Speaker 1: it left a significant mark on scholastic history. It all
Speaker 1: started in the early nineteen fifties, when fitness activists doctor
Speaker 1: Hans Krauss and Bonnie Pruden administered exercise tests to thousands
Speaker 1: of kids throughout the United States, Switzerland, Italy, and Austria.
Speaker 1: US kids came up shockingly short. Fifty eight percent of
Speaker 1: them failed the tests, compared to just eight percent of
Speaker 1: the European kids. Then President Dwight Eisenhower was not pleased.
Speaker 1: He took action by forming the President's Council on Youth
Speaker 1: Fitness in nineteen fifty six to seek out strategies for
Speaker 1: improving American kids fitness scores. Concern mounted by the time
Speaker 1: John F. Kennedy took office in nineteen sixty he penned
Speaker 1: a Sports Illustrated op ed about the perceived problem, an
Speaker 1: excerpt in a very real and immediate sense, our growing softness,
Speaker 1: our increasing lack of physical fitness is a menace to
Speaker 1: our security. And so in nineteen sixty six, the Presidential
Speaker 1: Physical Fitness Challenge commenced, a competition of sorts designed to
Speaker 1: get kids excited about physical fitness as it related to
Speaker 1: military service. The challenge included activities like a softball throw,
Speaker 1: a long jump, and that dreaded pull up, all meant
Speaker 1: to mimic military tasks like grenade throwing and ladder climbing.
Speaker 1: To earn the coveted physical fitness awards, kids would have
Speaker 1: to place in the top eighty fifth percentile based on
Speaker 1: national standards. The problem with all this testing, which by
Speaker 1: the way, was usually done in front of one's peers,
Speaker 1: was that, according to experts, it didn't resemble the Krause
Speaker 1: Weber tests in any way. Rather than focusing on core
Speaker 1: and arm strength and improved flexibility, the Presidential Physical Fitness
Speaker 1: Challenge simply reflected the goals and priorities of the country
Speaker 1: and people who had formed their fitness philosophy during training
Speaker 1: in World War Two years later, in twenty twelve, the
Speaker 1: test was finally abolished and replaced by a more comprehensive
Speaker 1: fitness program designed to support individual goals rather than prescribe
Speaker 1: as standard fitness regimen. The change was the result of
Speaker 1: decades of negative feedback from both students and teachers. Physical
Speaker 1: education teacher Joanna Faber told NPR the test was totally backward.
Speaker 1: We knew who was going to be last, and we
Speaker 1: were in embarrassing them, We were pointing out their weakness.
Speaker 1: So where does that leave us now? And why are
Speaker 1: teachers still testing kids at all? We spoke with Marisol Visali,
Speaker 1: a San Francisco Bay Area physical education teacher and massage therapist.
Speaker 1: She said, the reason for the tests, I believe is
Speaker 1: basically to collect data so the state knows fitness levels
Speaker 1: of different demographics and counties, schools, cities, etc. But we
Speaker 1: teachers do our best to turn it into goal setting
Speaker 1: and teaching students about their bodies. We also turn it
Speaker 1: into awards for students with the most improvements or best
Speaker 1: scores to create some buy in and get them motivated
Speaker 1: to be fit people. While the current program continues to
Speaker 1: focus on specific areas of fitness, there's a decidedly less
Speaker 1: militaristic approach to it. For instance, Fasally says there are
Speaker 1: different options for each of the five categories that are
Speaker 1: tested cardiovascular fitness, muscular endurance, muscular strength, flexibility, and body
Speaker 1: composition which is muscle to fat ratio. These options acknowledge
Speaker 1: different types of fitness far better than the original test
Speaker 1: in taking into account the different ways kids' bodies work
Speaker 1: based on age and sex, and acknowledging that fitness is
Speaker 1: a spectrum. So how many kids do well on this test?
Speaker 1: Zali said the number of kids that pass usually depends
Speaker 1: on the school. In Burlingame, California, for example, where I teach,
Speaker 1: most kids pass I'd say eighty five percent, but that
Speaker 1: has to do with a lot more than just our
Speaker 1: awesome physical education teachers. She explains that the kids in
Speaker 1: her community are really active outside of school, whereas in
Speaker 1: poorer areas the number of kids that pass could be
Speaker 1: much lower. For many reasons, children might not be active
Speaker 1: outside of school due to lack of local programs, time,
Speaker 1: or funding. Punishing and humiliating tests certainly aren't the way
Speaker 1: to get kids in shape, but encouraging physical activity of
Speaker 1: some kind is important, since it's been shown to help
Speaker 1: kids build cardio fitness, strong bones and muscles, and even
Speaker 1: reduce symptoms of anxiety and depression. According to the Centers
Speaker 1: of Disease Control and Prevention, only twenty one point six
Speaker 1: percent of six to nineteen year old children and adolescents
Speaker 1: in the United States get sixty or more minutes of
Speaker 1: moderate to vigorous physical activity at least five days per week.
Speaker 1: But don't be discouraged. Any activity is better than no activity.
Speaker 1: There are lots of guides online to making fitness fun,
Speaker 1: even for the less coordinated among us. Today's episode is
Speaker 1: based on article could you pass your kids middle School?
Speaker 1: Fitness tests on how stuffworks dot Com, written by Michelle Constantinovsky.
Speaker 1: Brain Stuff is production of by Heart Radio in partnership
Speaker 1: with HowStuffWorks dot Com and is produced by Tyler Playing.
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