Is PE in state schools still the same waste of time it was 10-20 years ago?

Posted by FlaviousTiberius@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 245 comments

Was reading about the government trying to make school meals healthier and combat obesity and it really made me think what an absolute waste of time PE was. Didn't seem to remotely be about helping kids to learn actual fitness and endurance. It just seemed to be a load of bald middle aged men having an excuse to LARP as drill sergeants and poorly matched sports games where the sporty kids would all be in one team and the less sporty ones on the other, so the sporty kids would just spend an hour and half decimating them over and over again. Not sure what the point of this was other than crushing the spirits of the less sports oriented kids. Surely would have been better to actually teach those kids how to get into better shape not just making them endure a pointless humiliation ritual. I don't know whether its improved but it always seemed like a great way to put out of shape kids off exercise for life.

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Dexevlol@reddit

I was supposedly unatheltic and not popular - and I hated PE. In primary school I was quite sporty and would play football on breaks, but this ended in high school as I was one of those kids that just didn't fit in. The group aspect made it awful. Then I got the opportunity to go on a school skiing trip and one of the teachers running the trip who taught PE put on his own fitness classes after school - which was basically circuits. Loved it. As an adult I can see the value in having group sports available, but I've never understood why PE does not focus more on personal fitness. Same situation with that food technology class. Thanks for teaching me how to bake 5 different types of cakes but no actual useful cooking skills. Useless. It's like the curicculum for these things was purposlessy deisgned to be unhelpful.

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CeridwenAeradwr@reddit

Uuugh, food tech was useless. It was way more focused around "designing" food in a theoretical sense than any actual practical skills and average person would make use of in day-to-day life. They never taught you any actually useful cooking skills because "This isn't *cooking*, this is *food tech*!" Which... Uh, cooking seems like a necessary prequisite skill for this? What the fuck am I supposed to do if I can't already cook?

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

When I was at school, the problem wasn’t PE it was competitive sports. If, like me, you had no aptitude and no interest, PE was just institutional humiliation, being shouted out by teachers and pupils for being unskilled while no one attempted to teach me how to be better. I still have anxiety dreams about it over 50 years later.

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Midnight7000@reddit

The only time I witnesses people getting grilled during PE is when they were just huddled up in their group talking about Runescape. It was deserved and the kid who yelled at them showed good leadership. It could do with heavier focus. It teaches a lot of soft skills and builds on the resilience needed to get through life.

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

Then you were lucky. I’m clumsy and for much of the time had undiagnosed shortsight, I was made utterly miserable for years, the butt of every joke, the last to be picked to join teams, my attempts to improve ignored at best and treated as a huge joke at worst. I’m 68 and I still have anxiety dreams about it.

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ChattyBear@reddit

Yes. Bullying and hectoring by teachers was quite the fashion in the 80s; it was abusive, in fact. I don’t remember my French teacher encouraging the bullying of those who couldn’t adequately conjugate a regular -er verb.

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riverend180@reddit

What I find funny is how kids who are shit at PE think they should get a free ride to just not bother because it's not fun and not nice, but the kids who are shit at maths are expected to just suck it up. If you don't like sports, that's fine. Just do your best for an hour or two a week, get some health benefits and maybe learn a thing or two. Instead all the fat lazy kids would just stand around spoiling it for everyone else because they're not interested, with zero consequence except perhaps a bit of internal embarrassment.

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HeadBat1863@reddit

>What I find funny is how kids who are shit at PE think they should get a free ride to just not bother because it's not fun and not nice, but the kids who are shit at maths are expected to just suck it up. Kids who aren't good at maths get taken through it so they get better. Can't throw or catch a ball? Tough shit, loser. Ever seen or heard about PE teachers teaching kids to throw or catch? No, me neither.

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riverend180@reddit

In fact, most kids who are crap at maths just get left behind. You learn throwing at catching in primary school PE, yes. By secondary school you should be able to throw and catch. It's the PE equivalent of being able to hold a pen.

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

>You learn throwing at catching in primary school PE, yes. No. And at the time I was living in a flat with no garden so I wasn't practicing at home either.

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riverend180@reddit

My 1 year old can kick, throw and catch. We do it in the living room. And in the park. There's no excuses. Just like there's no excuse for kids not to be able to read or write b

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

Your experience isn't universal. We didn't throw things around our living room so we didn't break things.

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riverend180@reddit

And yet we've never broken anything with the soft kids balls that are made to be thrown around indoors. And explains why you're a grown adult who can't throw or catch a ball.

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

OTOH I did learn enough maths at school to get a subsequent STEM qualification and career which has turned out to be more useful than throwing foam rubber balls.

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riverend180@reddit

Likewise. The two aren't mutually exclusive

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

Do people shout “idiot” at you in maths? Do they beg for you not to be on their team because you’ll make their maths worse? Do you have to do maths in freezing cold in clothes singularly badly adapted to the weather?

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riverend180@reddit

For the kids who hate maths it's worse than being in the freezing cold, some kids like that. Fact is, all kids have things they're good at and things they're bad at. It's only PE where kids are allowed to just not participate and mope around without any consequences.

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

Not in my school they weren’t- we ran laps and came in last while people stood on the finish line and jeered. We stood around where the sporty kids picked teams, knowing full well you’d be picked last and never get the ball passed to you. You’d get handed a tennis racket and then spend the lesson picking balls out of the netting while your opponent sighed if you were lucky or shouted at you while sending the ball past you if you weren’t. You went on circular cross country runs and only found out in your twenties you weren’t supposed to run long distances on your toes.

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riverend180@reddit

Where/when did you go to school that has tennis courts?

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

They doubled as netball courts and five aside pitches. The markings were just different colours. Left school 1975

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riverend180@reddit

Yeah so OP was about 10-20 years, I left school 14 years ago. You left school 51 years ago, so not really relevant.

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

And if weights are out. Individual time trials instead of races - something for an unsporty kid to aim for instead of always being dead last.

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HeadBat1863@reddit

Did a PE teacher write this?

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

I wasn't fat, lazy or trying to spoil things for others when I was dumped on a rugby pitch and expected to magically know how to play. In maths lessons the teacher actually explains what you're supposed to be doing.

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riverend180@reddit

Why did you reply if my comment wasn't about you then

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

My reply is a follow-up to your comment. You've assumed that people who dislike PE are only doing so because they're fat, lazy and wanting to spoil things for others. That's not the case. Were you always last to be picked in logic class?

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riverend180@reddit

In the majority of cases they were fat. Not always though. Always lazy however. Kids would be rightly called out if they were as disinterested in other classes as those lot were in PE

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

>while no one attempted to teach me how to be better. I had 5 years of rugby. The only thing I can remember being told is that you can't tackle someone by grabbing their collar. 5 years. You stand on the pitch and you're apparently supposed to instantly know how to play. Like The Matrix.

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Sophie_Blitz_123@reddit

No but really why don't they explain the rules before they make you play rugby 😅 is it like fight club.

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mattarei@reddit

Rugby was my least favourite. Played in the winter, in the rain. I'm freezing, wet and miserable, with no interest in the sport. You wouldn't force adults to be out in those conditions if they hadn't signed up for it, so why do we make kids do it. I can see how it's good to give children a taste of all different sports, but those lessons certainly didn't nurture a love of the game

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bacon_cake@reddit

Wow. In retrospect I genuinely can't think of a single thing I learned in PE. I'm actually racking my brain... I mean I guess you could say "how to play as a team" but I hated that then and I don't partake in any team sports now either.

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Any_Crazy_500@reddit

Passing a ball backwards on rugby and you can only take three steps with the ball in basketball. That’s about the sum of it for me.

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Consistent-Pirate-23@reddit

We got taught how to rugby tackle with no concept of similar sized kids practicing together. First attempt my mate who was 4 stone heavier than me, rugby tackles me, I fall backward and feel like I have been knocked out

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minipainteruk@reddit

This was very much my experience in the 90s/2000s too. Some people just aren't sporty. I was one of them. Being forced to humiliate myself doing something I was awful at, in front of students who would actively mock you for being bad at it, does not ingraine a healthy relationship with exercise.

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SimplyFootballNet@reddit

Is this not the case for any subject though. If you're a bad reader, and you have to go stand at the front of the class to read; then that is also an equally humiliating and hard experience?

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minipainteruk@reddit

In some ways, but I think it's different. Most subjects do separate kids by ability, so you're in classes with people around the same level as you (unless you went to a tiny school). Typically, people who struggle at reading are around people who also struggle at reading. I also think the competitive nature and fact that P.E. often as you split into teams, it quickly creates a "Dont pick that person!" Atmosphere that other subjects rarely have, because you generally aren't separated into 2 groups to read in front of the class in a competition.

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SimplyFootballNet@reddit

Hmm? Very fair points! I never experienced this side of it in PE classes, as I was decent at sport and looked forward to all aspects of it.

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

Had sports consisted of personal targets, something I could see an improvement in, had they had weight training or treadmills or something I could measure myself against, it would have been different. In stead I ended up doing the same as the kids who played for their school and county teams and failing miserably while being jeered at.

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minipainteruk@reddit

I'd have been happy to walk on a treadmill for an hour. Instead, we played bench ball, which is useless as I can neither throw or catch, and was particularly short as a teen. We did this for a solid 2 years for every lesson. It was awful.

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SimplyFootballNet@reddit

Cannot really do weight training at school, equipment is too dangerous & expensive to buy, and it can too easily negatively affected growth and cause injury. But it could and should have been more focused.

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

Yup. If it had been personal targets, timed runs where you could aim to beat your own time, not just races you always ended up miles behind.

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appletinicyclone@reddit

If we were a sensible country there would have been a variety of physical activities to choose from so it was less performative and humiliating I hated the pe sports stuff for the most part but when we did long jump that was fun. If they had badminton courts I would have been down for that instead of gymnastics and athletics embarrassments. Heck in 6th form we were allowed to go bowling which was great because you walked too and from the bowling place and that took time plus the bowling itself had some element of hand eye coordination and skill mastery so it was fun But what you get due to budgeting and other crap is just lowest common denominator no equipment type options instead

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runrunrudolf@reddit

I had lots of sports options which was great. I chose rock climbing and bouldering (we had an indoor wall) but there was badminton, lacrosse, rugby, tennis, netball, hockey… made it far less arduous when you weren’t particularly sporty.

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appletinicyclone@reddit

>had lots of sports options which was great. I chose rock climbing and bouldering (we had an indoor wall) but there was badminton, lacrosse, rugby, tennis, netball, hockey That is pretty amazing, did you go to a private school or somewhere just with well funded schooling?

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runrunrudolf@reddit

It was a grammar school so technically a state school but I imagine it had very good funding. About 150 kids each year from year 9-13 and this was in the 00s.

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Paladin2019@reddit

Same. In my late twenties I discovered a sport I actually enjoyed and went on to represent my country in it at veterans (over 40s) level. I resent my PE experience at school for killing my enthusiasm for sport until I was almost 30.

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pusopdiro@reddit

I'm dyspraxic and am only now at 27 starting to exercise willingly because of how awful I was at PE and how humiliating it was.

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FranzFerdinand51@reddit

And you think that doesnt apply to everything else at school, just you and pe? People that werent good at art werent being humiliated? People trying their best and still failing at academic subjects were just fine?

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pusopdiro@reddit

I never knew what anyone else's grades were in academic subjects unless they told me themselves. PE is in front of literally everyone.

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Realistic-River-1941@reddit

English teachers accepted that some kids were better at maths. Science teachers accepted that some kids were better at history. PE teachers thought anyone who wasn't born knowing how to play this term's sport was worthless scum. I was no good at English ("what was a made up person thinking?") but never publicly mocked for it.

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minipainteruk@reddit

Wow. I'd love for you to show me where I said any of that.

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Jerico_Hill@reddit

You what grinds my gears? That no one tried to teach us how to throw a ball or whatever. A good friend of mine recently taught me how to throw a basketball, and guess what? Turns out that is something I can do, with just a little bit of help. Makes me what to hunt down my PE teachers and slap them.

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Shyaustenwriter@reddit

I was in my 20s before someone told me I wasn’t supposed to run longer distances on my toes.

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SignNotInUse@reddit

The few times we had indoor strength training were the only times I enjoyed PE because otherwise unless you could run fast or catch a ball PE was hell. I'm short, stocky, built for endurance, and basically blind in one eye without my glasses. No amount of shouting was going to change that it just ensured that even as an adult I'm deeply uncomfortable doing any form of intense exercise in front of people.

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D0wnInAlbion@reddit

When I was at school, this was resolved by putting people in appropriate sets. It meant that the abilities were usually roughly the same.

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Any_Crazy_500@reddit

I’m 54 and yeah, I was one of the ones that had no natural talent for sports, so the teachers just used to make us target practice for their anger. Literally sometimes. And don’t get me started on the getting changed ritual that they made us do. That left scars.

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BritsinFrance@reddit

And others feel tge same about academia

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Gisschace@reddit

Took me to my 20s to discover I am actually a really active person who will have a go at everything, looking back I was a really active kid. Always out on my bike or swimming or climbing. But didn’t think I was because I am just not competitive at all, I have no interest in keeping score. My only competition is with myself to get better. Thing is, my partners a PE teacher and he is competitive and it is a source of friction between us where if we’re trying something new (like disc golf) he’ll insist on us doing it properly, keeping scores (I just make up random numbers) etc. and that ruins the fun for me.

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CoffeeeGoblin@reddit

Yeah this was my experience but more in high school. Eventually I stopped participating because I just had no interest in sports. They tried to force me but eventually they had to give up, they couldnt really do anything about it. They put me on "record" but I was great in the actual classroom and did well academically and the only teacher that had an issue was the former Army PE teacher that thought he could bring that military mindset into a school. I think I embarrassed him as I stood my ground and he found he couldnt intimidate a 14 year old.

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SpectreSingh89@reddit

Sorry to hear that. I was once made as a "Substitute" and sat there for an hour not doing anything. The sporty knew how to gang on the non sporties. Teachers wouldn't intervene, absolutely no structure. Just let the sporties decide and thas it.

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Frequent-Contact-645@reddit

Where am i today lads? Left back Left back? So i get to play Hahaha no fuck off, left back in the changing room

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TrumpGrabbedMyCat@reddit

Did trampolining for some reason, the shithead PE teacher who constantly laughed at the less athletic kids gave me one attempt to do a front roll and then moved onto the next kid. Absolute waste of an hour, while everyone did their best not to sweat because they didn't want to have to shower naked in front of everyone else.

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FlaviousTiberius@reddit (OP)

It was basically the equivalent of teaching someone how to box by giving them zero training and then putting them in a ring with a seasoned boxer who's 100lbs heavier. Then just letting said seasoned boxer beat the ever loving shit out of him over and over again.

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AskingBoatsToSwim@reddit

It’s insane anybody thought that should be how PE worked. What did they think it was for? Was any thought ever put into it?

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kestrelita@reddit

My daughter came home buzzing this week, because they were doing orienteering in PE and she really enjoyed it. She has coordination issues and really struggles in PE, I'm pleased they're doing different sports/activities and encouraging everyone to spend time outdoors.

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lostinclag@reddit

Side note, see if your local orienteering club has any events on for your daughter and/or you to have a go at (my local clubs do intro events on Saturdays and midweek in the summer aimed at newcomers including children). Orienteering isn't as popular as it was (was never *that* popular tbh) and any small amount of enthusiasm by newcomers who want to try the sport is really appreciated by clubs.

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kestrelita@reddit

That's a really good point, will have a look! She has done a bit of it before through Woodcraft Folk, but not consistently.

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heroics-delta8s@reddit

We regularly did orienteering as a geography field trip or on a residential place the school owned. But then one of the finest national parks in the world was on our doorstep.

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dratsaab@reddit

Our school (am a teacher) has done Geocaching in PE - it always went down well as there are bunch of accessible ones near us. A few took it up recreationally.

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Ruu2D2@reddit

We did orienteering. I dypraxic and it was one only thing I enjoyed

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Emsicals@reddit

I love this. My daughter also did orienteering this week. She isn't sporty at all and never gets picked by people to be on their teams. Her friends all partnered up without her for the orienteering. But it backfired on them because she might not be able to run fast but she can read maps whereas the rest of them couldn't so she ended up getting ahead. She had a great time.

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AndyWtrmrx@reddit

I was chatting to a friend in Sweden about orienteering. His eldest is the same age as my eldest and he was saying how much the kids love it - it really ticks them into doing exercise because they're so focused on the map reading. I wish it was more common here.

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ktitten@reddit

At my secondary school, 10-15 years ago, we did a lot of orienteering. It was the activity that the teachers set up when they couldn't be arsed to teach anything else, and they knew it would keep us occupied. Pretty sure as I got into year 10 and 11, about half the classes were orienteering or 'go walk/run around the field'.

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OutdoorApplause@reddit

One of the schools I'm looking at for my kid has a forest school element and one of the PE options is woodland management. I'd have loved that as a non sporty kid, and no one can tell me that sawing up some logs with a hand saw isn't good exercise!

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DameKumquat@reddit

My chemistry teacher got tasked with running some PE lessons that wouldn't have half the class skiving off. Orienteering was his best success (another teacher introduced ballroom dancing). Unfortunately there weren't many trees near our school, so you got descriptions like 'Copse' - 10 feet up a tree, 'Water Trough' - in the water, and my favourite, 'Cow" - cue trying to catch the right cow in a field of 20 and being yelled at by the farmer. Ended up doing some competitions - because everyone sets off at different times on different courses, when you hit the finish line no-one knows if you were amazing or terrible so you all get applause. There's fixed courses in many parks, but most haven't been maintained since Covid.

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Nemariwa@reddit

I've been saying for 25+ years orienteering would have been game changing for me. I could walk miles as a kid but couldn't pass a ball accurately

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Hot-Clerk504@reddit

Wasn’t a waste of time at all. Was a time where we bonded, had many scraps and learnt to work as a team. Far far more valuable than RE, Geography or languages. Just because you seemed to hate it doesn’t mean it’s a waste of time

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ChattyBear@reddit

The E is supposed to stand for Education, but all you learn is that if you don’t work hard at the proper subjects, you might end up as a PE teacher.

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heroics-delta8s@reddit

I remember cross country, but no training or build up learning how to run. Just the sporty kids running 3 miles and getting a great time and everyone else running to the end of the first street and walking the rest. Zero progression. How amazing would it have been for those who could run without support just go and run, and the rest do sixty second run, two minute walks for week 1, and then for week 2 2 minute runs, and a minute walks so, on so but the end of six to nine weeks, pretty much all the kids would be able to run the three miles, even at a slow pace. This for every single sport done at PE in school. No progression, no skills learnt or improved upon.

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riverend180@reddit

You say that like the kids who couldn't run had any interest in learning how. In my class they just saw cross country as a chance to have a stroll and a chat with their mates with no intention of actively participating and no sense of embarrassment about it. There were plenty of kids who were crap at sport but gave it a good go, and those ones got the right attention from the PE teachers.

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heroics-delta8s@reddit

Because its really difficult to run if you are not fit, but dead easy to learn. No one bothered explaining.

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riverend180@reddit

Lol none of them were interested, be real

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heroics-delta8s@reddit

You could say that about any subject at school. Maths, English and Science. The point was it was a subject in which we were supposed to learn something. Running is incredibly easy, even easier when you are fourteen, pretty much no matter what your weight or your fitness. But, it takes a bit of build up to learn. Run walk would have got even the laziest and the slowest doing the whole thing without stopping by the end of six weeks.

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riverend180@reddit

The point is that if you didn't bother with maths English and science you got in trouble. In PE it was just accepted. In my class the kids who didn't bother with PE wouldn't have been interested in attempting run walk. They'd bail out of the bleep test in the walking phase because they couldn't be bothered trying

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diyguitarist@reddit

That's just all PE lessons though wasn't it? Can you already do this or already played this sport? Yes, then you're going to be good. Oh you can't, never tried and don't even know the rules of the sport or even seen it on TV? Tough tits turkelton, we're not here to teach we're here to watch you not be able to play the sport and be soundly run rings around by the people who can. There was never any drills, training, theory about anything, just play and hope you can figure it out.

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Asleep-Software-4160@reddit

This is what every other class was like for non-academic kids tbh. Just a battering in a rigid system.

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ComprehensiveCode805@reddit

Except that all us kids who were acing science class didn't typically gang up to throw shade on anyone who couldn't handle a quadratic. It's been a long time since I was in school. Late 90s. I hope it's changed. Back then all that mattered was PE. You could be a literal genius at science and maths, but if you weren't on the football team then you were just social filth.

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Affectionate_You_858@reddit

Are you sure you didn't got to school in an American teen movie? I was at secondary school 97-04, I was on the football but no one cared. Those who liked sports played them, those who didn't done their own thing and nobody cared either way. You were friends with people who liked what you did. In a year of a couple hundred people, 17 people being part of a local team isn't exactly important

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riverend180@reddit

It's projection. These people wished they were good at sports and in their own heads perceived the sporty kids as cool, probably from watching too many American movies. The reality is most people didn't give a shit but a few insecure people think everyone does care. And there's a high proportion of those people on Reddit for obvious reasons

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GeminiCheese@reddit

Same age. One of our year groups was weirdly good at Basketball and won the UK schools championship. They got to go on a trip to Italy to play in a European tournament against a bunch of other national champions. They had local news reports on them etc. None of the other kids in the school even remotely cared. I was the fat kid who was nearly dying every time there was cross country in PE. No-one gave me shit about it. I was an absolutely deadly goal poacher in the playground mass football games. That earned me a nickname (John Hartson - Chubby, slightly ginger, doesn't run much, scores goals). I set up a wargaming club during lunch breaks that eventually had about 50 people turning up each week. Proper nerdy. Never caused me any problems. Not sure if things have changed, but the impression I get from my own children, and from the work I do with kids is that we have become much more of a 'face' culture similar to my experiences with Phillipino sailors. The fear of being seen to be publicly different is far more present than before, whilst actual consequences (stigma, ostracisation, bullying) are actually less common or severe. Pretty sure it is a consequence of social media. Kids are scared to act goofy because someone will inevitably film it and distribute it to the entire world.

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SeoulGalmegi@reddit

>Back then all that mattered was PE. You could be a literal genius at science and maths, but if you weren't on the football team then you were just social filth. Maybe some schools were like that, but this seems like having watched too many US high school movies. I didn't have a clue who was on the football team. It wasn't a thing anybody outside of the team cared about in the slightest.

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Morph_The_Merciless@reddit

In the school I went to (mid to late 90s, small town secondary school in Scotland), none of the other students particularly gave a shit who was on the football/rugby/basketball/hockey teams but the senior staff DID and pressured the rest of the teachers to turn a blind eye to literally anything the sporty ones got up to. An example would be made of any normal kid for an infraction half as bad as something a ballchucker would get away with. Also, anyone accusing one or more of the team members of anything (up to and including SA 😬) had the remainder of their time at school made a fucking misery. The fact that the sports teams rarely won a match (in literally any sport), and frequently finished in last place in their leagues somehow just made it fucking worse!

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riverend180@reddit

There's no way this is true

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Jerico_Hill@reddit

In fairness my school was very similar. I mean no one cared about the football team but if you weren't good at sports you mays well have been dead socially.

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GodEmprahBidoof@reddit

Did the non-sporty kids at your school just...not talking to each other? I hung out with loads of non-sporty kids at school

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Minimum_Possibility6@reddit

Similar here, considering most sports in the UK are done outside with clubs, being on the school team wasn't seen as prestigious.

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AutomaticInitiative@reddit

My high school called itself a 'sports college' lmao. It was dreadful then, with the moderately achieving sports being the only bright spot. It was knocked down and replaced with an academy that is now just bad lmao.

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GetInYourBasket@reddit

I knew a handful of people on the football team, because football was their entire personality. A few of the others I knew because I was friends with them in general. Their place on the football team did not have any impact on their popularity.

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Broccoli--Enthusiast@reddit

I don't think iv heard of many UK schools having sports teams that mattered in any way? Are you a lost bot?

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Luna259@reddit

Didn’t happen at my school from what I remember. Nobody cared if you were bad at a thing to bully you over it

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Hame_Impala@reddit

Suppose we all had different experiences. Never felt it was quite as bad in my school. One thing that helped is our PE teachers were generally alright, one of them in particular would be really friendly with anyone who put in the minimum effort, and didn’t mind taking the sportier kids down a peg or two if they were too arrogant.

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Potential-Note2381@reddit

Imagine if a maths teacher asked the class to get into teams, for a Maths challenge, with the two best kids as team leaders, picking their team mates until everyone knew who was good/bad at maths (and/or popular). No one would think that teacher was treating the kids who aren’t good at maths well, or in a way that would enable them to find confidence/competence in their own level of maths (so they could use it in every day life). As far as I can tell, with two kids at secondary school, PE teachers are still the same as when I was there, and have no interest in engendering a lifelong love/like for physical activity, they’re still very happy for less sporty kids to be humiliated for two hours a week.

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Temporary-Zebra97@reddit

Never saw that at my old school, the only stand outs was a lad who played cricket for the county, and another who played county & country rugby. They only stood out as they got a larger portion of lunch, and they were off school occasionally to play and got to go to india/australia etc. No one gave a shit, It did nothing for their social status it wasn't a high school in the states. I only found out that the rugby kid was on the winning team for England Rugby under 16s and played at the Wembley final when I was in his room and saw a photo and his medal and asked him about it.

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Quixoticish@reddit

Went to school in the late 80's and 90's and this is exactly how it was. All of the popular kids somehow ended up on the football team so noone gave a shit if you excelled in any other area, if you did you were just a geek and ostracised. Want to do sports? Play football or do cross country. Tennis, volleyball, basketball? Yeah you get one session a year, then back to cross country (running in laps around the school field at primary school, actually being sent into the wild at secondary school) or football. And there seemed to be zero actual coaching or teaching, just an expectation that you already knew exactly what to do. I remember being dragged out in front of the class in secondary school, one by one, for our "skin fold test" where they put little clamps on your arm to measure how chubby you were. I was by no means unfit, just a large kid. I hiked, I swam, I did a lot of Karate and Judo outside of school. And of course when they take your reading they announced it in front of everyone. The humiliation still sticks with me and has led to a lifetime of yo-yo dieting and body dismorphia, which wasn't helped with report cards that gave terrible grades for PE and snarky comments about how it clearly wasn't the thing for me. GIVE ME SOME FUCKING ADVICE AND HELP THEN! I am now a full time martial arts instructor and it still wakes me up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night from time to time. Fuck you Mr. Smith.

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LordSwright@reddit

Probably more to do with the sporty kids on the team are also the popular outgoing "in crowd" kids Just a coincidence thry we're also football team

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Affectionate_You_858@reddit

Generally because they've grown up with team sports so I are used to mixing with others and meeting new people

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Gisschace@reddit

But exactly like you say there was bullying, I think OPs point is that school was a shit time for lots of people who didn’t ’conform’ to a rigid standard

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caniuserealname@reddit

I went to school in the late 90s/ early 00s and I can say that I don't have a clue what you're taking about. My high school was even sports focused, had special grants as a sports college, but outside of pe people literally didn't give a shit how good you were at sports.

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DenseRequirements@reddit

I feel those people saw their belonging outside school in libraries and social clubs than school. Now it's flipped where nerdy kids see their belonging in school while sporty kids see it outside school.

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Iamthe0c3an2@reddit

It seems like a generational thing, but in the 2000s and 2010s it mattered less how good you were at sports or footie.

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Tay74@reddit

I mean, as a smart kid, I was instructed to help and support and basically be a support teacher for some of the students who struggled more in the class, in more traditional academic subjects In PE, the sporty kids were allowed to bully me in front of the teachers and only got apologies from the teachers about having to be paired with me, and when I said fuck this actually I'm not really in the mood for badminton anymore and sat down, I got threatened with detention. Similarly, I don't imagine many of the academic teachers were basically encouraging disordered eating and body image issues in the students (ours used to tell us "wow most of you have packed on the weight over Christmas, I think yous could stand to skip a few lunches" and stuff like that) I'm not saying no academic teacher has ever been toxic, and I'm sure being a slower kid is difficult in those circumstances too, but there was a level of cruelty and toxicity baked into the entire PE department at my school

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FlaviousTiberius@reddit (OP)

I definitely remember art being the same. For some reason our art teacher though shouting at kids and humiliating them for being bad at drawing was somehow going to improve their art skills (surprise, it didnt)

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Mediocre_Sprinkles@reddit

Art was the only class I ever got detention in. I'm just really bad at drawing, I actively avoid it now as an adult. My toddler's starting to get into arts and crafts and I break out in a cold sweat when I have to help.

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glosoli-@reddit

Ditto! I remember the task, get 2 coloured pencils (Green / Yellow) and draw random lines that are 1-2cm length across a sheet of A4 paper to fill it up, anything you like. Did it. Someone failed, was wrong, got shouted at and had to be brought back in at lunchtime. I don't know how you fail draw anything you want on an a4 page with 2 coloured pencils but using lines.. but I did. Had to re-do it. Still don't understand what was wrong to this day, even after re-doing it. Art / French / PE was every other Friday for me in that year, coincidentally that also happened to be the Friday I was off ill, hated all three of those "subjects" as just seemed like you either have it or don't and if you don't, then you're a failure, rather than here's the knowledge / skill gap we can work on to make you better. Final exam for Art that year was draw your hand (with shading all that stuff), just traced the outline of my hand on a piece of paper in 1 minute - as for the written component of the art exam, I just wrote the names of the TMNT, again got shouted at and held up as the worst Art exam ever (guess that's an achievement). BTW was top 10-20% in most other subjects, and by A-levels (when obviously you get more specialised) was top 2%. Guess it was a useful lesson to learn early, if youre \*\*\*\* at something, just ditch it quickly and move onto something you're good at, as (FOR ME PERSONALLY) 1 hour invested in Maths / Science was a lot more useful than 1 hour invested in Art.

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RoyalConflict1@reddit

My mum complained one year because my art teacher gave me a 1/5 for effort and a 1/5 for attainment and I'd actually tried really fucking hard. Teacher was like "I'm not marking up her attainment grade, it's all terrible" and mum didn't give a fuck and just didn't want her thinking I didn't try 😂 My 9 year old loves arts and crafts stuff and even she is like "it's okay mummy you can just watch" haha

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QueefInMyKisser@reddit

As someone who was pretty shit at both art and PE, art was loads worse, but then you did get to drop it

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Hame_Impala@reddit

In PE there was usually something you were particularly passable at even if you weren’t overly sporty. Art felt like there was nowhere to hide if you were just inherently useless at it.

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Asleep-Software-4160@reddit

Hah! Yeah, my art classes were just marks out of ten (low in my case) once a week with no indication of what was wrong or how to improve. At least with running I genuinely got better at it the more I did it!

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D0wnInAlbion@reddit

I used to dread art. One of the flaws with our education system is for practical subjects is that they are usually taught by people who had some degree of natural ability so they never had to learn techniques which may help the least able. I would hope this has changed now.

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Asleep-Software-4160@reddit

That's exactly my memory of art in particular. Literally told I wasn't allowed to do it at GCSE by my arsehole teacher.

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liseusester@reddit

My art teacher told me that if I took GCSE art, he'd quit teaching. I had no intention of taking it until that point.

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Realistic-River-1941@reddit

No-one got punched for not being good at geography. English teachers didn't try to publicly humiliate kids for being better at maths. There was no sense that if you weren't born already knowing how to solve quadratic equations then you were an irredeemable failure in life.

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Asleep-Software-4160@reddit

I mean, my English teacher bullied me relentlessly for being too shy and unhappy. Needless to say, that really brought me out of my shell. PE teachers not noticing me at all was a far better experience!

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itsfourinthemornin@reddit

Yeah, I spoke about this on another post the other day. My English teacher spent most of the lesson being de-railed by uh, "popular kids" (I hate the term, they were only "popular" amongst themselves. Reality most people disliked them because they were awful shits.) to brigade stories of his past. I already was bullied, he effectively gave it a green light in his class by also picking on me (for being "shy"- read: bullied so I kept quiet - and alternative). Thankful after a few months of refusal to attend the lesson, I was allowed to switch teachers.

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Competitive_Pen7192@reddit

School is partly a shit way to socialise everyone into being adults in wider society. It did a pretty good job of showing you how shit many things were and you just had to turn up and do enough not to completely fail and get noticed. It's helped me in my career sadly lol

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Realistic-River-1941@reddit

But in the real world you can't punch someone and expect the people in charge to think it's funny and they deserved it because they look like they once read a book.

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Mabenue@reddit

Depends on your industry

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h00dman@reddit

I can think of boxers and television presenters of popular car programs, anything else?

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alphahydra@reddit

A lot of smaller, blue-collar, male-dominated businesses are like the 70s still. Independent car repair places, small warehouses, scrap merchants, fabrication workshops, etc. Not all, but you'd be surprised how many, especially if they're the sort of place that's less public facing or only deal with a small cross section of similar business customers. Titty calendar in the office, dirty banter, racial "jokes", workplace wind-up merchant who gets away with it because "that's just Dave", ganging up to take the piss out of the new guy, blokes squaring up to each other once in a while...

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Realistic-River-1941@reddit

Okay, apart from PE teaching...

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SeoulGalmegi@reddit

Right ~ Book smart, but unsporty, kids get to experience for an hour or so a week what the majority of lessons are like for the others all week haha

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acertainpossibility@reddit

Since I finished doing PE at school in 2017 (end of Year 11) I don't know if I am target audience for this post. What I will say though is going to a boys Grammar school (it was mixed gender in sixth form), it was hard to be someone not good at sports. The one time I had a good experience was with a teacher who taught us table tennis I think and he left with his girlfriend to go to Australia so didn't really see him again. Now I just started as a Humanities Teacher in a secondary school. And I'm friends with two PE teachers who are all relatively new to the profession (I started in January, they started in September, tbh one started a bit earlier but I digress). I also trained at the same provider as one of them. Both of those teachers tbh if I had them as teachers when I was at school I'd enjoy it more I think. I was also shy to take part in a staff badminton but realised they're not as competitive as being a student in school was. And I enjoyed it and will go again. I rambled a lot but I'd like to think the situation has changed especially with the newer teachers like those I mentioned.

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thejoshway@reddit

This is the type of thing people who didn’t want to participate in PE would say to justify them sitting out and not exercising.

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Luna259@reddit

I liked PE. It was here’s a sport that you might not have been interested in before, here’s how to play it, now let’s play. That or here’s a fitness test, here’s how it’s done, now let’s do it. A bit of fun and a break for two hours where I actually learned new sports

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shark-with-a-horn@reddit

We used to randomly do cross country running or occasionally sprinting, without ever being taught any running technique or building up stamina Don't see how that was helpful to anyone, it just taught me to hate running because I wasn't naturally good at it

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chocolateybiscuit81@reddit

Pretty much. The “teacher” is always someone who loved playing football etc at break when they were at school but were never good enough to turn pro or bright enough to be a proper teaching so they decided to be like peter pan and never grow up. If you’re not on the school sports teams you basically don’t exist to them.

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Dangerous-Stress-849@reddit

My 1980s PE sessions were equally pointless. I like to think that all those sporty kids would be envious of my Parkrun times now.. it's amazing how far you can go when you're not being ritually humiliated.

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Born-Wasabi8016@reddit

If every high school had a well equipped gym on site that was open to pupils in the evenings and weekend s as well as pe lessons. You would have a generation of absolutely hench 6th formers within a couple of years.

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Mediocre_Sprinkles@reddit

My school had a good gym, we were allowed in it one lesson a year and there were 5 machines for 30 kids.

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Miss_Type@reddit

My school (I'm a teacher) has a great fitness suite. Lots of machines and weights, as well as mats, boxing equipment, and those little trampoline things. The older years can use it at lunch and after school, and during their free periods (if there are no lessons in there). The big problem with opening the space in the evenings and weekends would be staffing - for it to be free for the kids to use, the school would have to cover the cost of two members of staff on site. Still, the kids enjoy PE lessons, and do a variety of activities including orienteering, rock climbing, swimming, dance, and all the usual games and athletics. I teach at a high achieving grammar school, typically nerdy kids you would say, and we have Olympians and national and regional team members as current and former students. A kid in my form plays cricket at a county level, another kid just had to pull out of the school play because rehearsal coincides with her swimming training and she was just asked to join a regional team. Pretty amazing! So, yeah, I guess not all PE lessons are awful.

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plant-strong@reddit

Mine was the same. I was always really interested in powerlifting and weightlifting, but my PE experience was rugby, cross country and football in the autumn and first half of spring, then badminton, trampolining and athletics in spring and summer, with one random “this is the gym” lesson a year where we all spent most of the time waiting around to do a single set of squats.

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Capable-Divider@reddit

Mine had this, nobody used it…

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ShufflingToGlory@reddit

Even just some monkey bars and horizontal bars in the playground would be great.

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HauntingTheVoid@reddit

We were told off for playing tag on our first day of secondary school. "No running allowed"

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veryordinarybloke@reddit

I hated it back in the 80s. Pointless humiliation. From what my sons said it's got a bit better. But you can't make a fitter nation through PE. Cut car use. It's the only way. But that means tackling the right wing press.

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EDKW92@reddit

For a “very ordinary bloke” that’s doesn’t seem like a very ordinary solution

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-Lifeisanillusion-@reddit

I have basically no depth perception and asthma so from a typical perspective I should have hated PE. I loved it. I wasn’t particularly good, never even learnt to do a push up. But my school never made it an issue. We did circuits and I could do lots of the stations. We did loads of games of tag with variations that made it so people such as me would be able to participate. Played Bench ball a lot and everyone was encouraging. If anyone did have to sit out for five minutes no issue was ever made. Did loads of taster sessions of different sports so loads of people found something they enjoyed. Had people from companies come in so we got chances to experience different coaching. Had a climbing wall come a couple of times and I loved that, an obstacle course came twice a year and that was great fun. Overall school PE can be great. They just have to implement it well.

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Fickle-Watercress-37@reddit

THE APPARATUS!

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Kapika96@reddit

Sounds like you just had shit PE teachers? PE class was always a fun one for me. Definitely wasn't one of the ″sporty″ kids, but the PE teachers were among the best at the school and it was always fun. Didn't like the ″dance″ classes, but football, basketball, cricket, badminton, tennis, hockey, javelin, shotput, rugby etc. were all enjoyable.

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Youutternincompoop@reddit

yeah I was a nerdy kid at school but I still loved P.E never got why some kids hated it, its the one time at school you can just switch your brain off for a bit, and when you're doing sports its basically recreational at that point.

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DarkStarComics333@reddit

I could switch my brain off in other subjects but PE I had to think about because I was extremely uncoordinated, didn't know how to play the sports they wanted me to (literally the first time I played netball I got given a vest with the mysterious letters WA on it and then sent out to play. Didn't know it stood for wing attack. Didn't know what wing attack was. Didn't know I couldn't run when I had the ball etc. Got shouted at by teachers and team mates for fucking up. I was 9) and I couldn't run fast or well, and that only got worse as I got older (was a DD cup by the time I was 14 and it hurt so much to run). So yeah fuck PE really. I never learned anything from it, I was never bothered with because I wasn't good at anything and the teachers had no inclination to try to help. It was just ritual humiliation week after week. At least in academic subjects there are sets and various programs to help less able kids.

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Hame_Impala@reddit

I mostly enjoyed it but in retrospect having to get back into a stuffy uniform when you're sweating to go sit in a Maths class was fucking diabolical.

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Impossible_Theme_148@reddit

Yes I was at school in the 90s and I didn't like PE but that's because I liked reading and thinking rather than anything remotely physical And I can't relate to anything people saying about teachers and sporty types picking on the non sporty ones I went to a very sporty school, the PE was all well structured and varied. The staff taught the sports and worked on improving everyone's results with encouragement and technique It just seems like PE is often staffed by the least able teachers - when it's done well then it's just a subject you might not like, but that's about it

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freexe@reddit

You can't just rely on good teachers though. The training needs to make sure sports are engaging and the kids have enough time to do them

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FlaviousTiberius@reddit (OP)

Well my school was in the bottom 5% for educational outcomes in the country so that wouldn't surprise me. But I do see a lot of people who had similar experience with PE, it did seem to be the one that was universally poorly taught.

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Dennyisthepisslord@reddit

Always thought PE every day for 90 minutes at the end of the school day in the warmer/lighter months would help. Parents dont need to leave work and kids get fit

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Pretend-City6652@reddit

As a teacher, I think that view is a bit outdated. PE now is very different when it’s done properly. In Year 5 we’re not just chucking a ball out and letting the “sporty kids” dominate. We structure it. Right now we’re doing tennis for an hour on Thursdays and tag rugby on Fridays. Skills, teamwork, decision making, confidence. The children genuinely love it. The bigger shift isn’t PE, it’s childhood. Ten to twenty years ago, kids weren’t going home to consoles, tablets and phones in the same way. Now I’ve got children who go home and don’t leave the house all evening. Some are on games until 10pm or later. No movement, no fresh air, no social sport. So PE isn’t the problem, it’s one of the few things counteracting that. For a lot of children, it’s the only time they properly move, interact face to face, and do something active that isn’t screen-based. Could it still be done badly in some schools? Yes, definitely. But when it’s taught well, it’s not a waste of time at all. It’s essential.

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Nafepaints@reddit

Do you run all your lessons through ChatGPT aswell?

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maroonneutralino@reddit

I'm a science teacher, all of the PE teachers use ChatGPT for everything at my school

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MattWillGrant@reddit

Whatever stops them eating the crayons.

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DoctorOctagonapus@reddit

"I'm Holly, the ship's computer, with an IQ of 6000. The same IQ as 6000 PE teachers."

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jackwls_@reddit

You do know some people just.. type correctly?

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rhubarbrhubarb78@reddit

I mean, a great 'tell' for AI writing is the 'The thing isn't X, it's Y' sentence structure, which this thing uses in spades. Even when it may be nonsensical. Can you tell me what 'The bigger shift isn't PE, it's Childhood' even means? It's not relevant to what the OP was asking. Also, you may notice how it didn't answer OPs question in any detail whatsoever! A teachers perspective on how they teach tennis or rugby would be really valuable! A real human being would understand this. AI gestures vaguely at substantive content and hopes you don't notice it hasn't really said anything. Their supposed greater point, about how kids are all on their screens these days, also isn't really relevant (you may notice how no-one else has mentioned this at all in the thread) and their entire message is weirdly confrontational and seems to misunderstand what OP is asking. OP: I had a rough time of PE when I was a child. Is it still like this? ChatGPT: PE isn't rough, it's synergetic. I resent the accusation that PE is like this nowadays, it isn't a method of beating children up, it's teaching children how to beat each other as a team. We teach tennis and rugby. Please don't ask me how we do that. It's not an evasion, it's a deliberate stylistic choice because I don't know. I am an AI and sycophantic at my core, so right at the end I'll acknowledge the possibility that you're correct in saying PE is bad *somewhere*, which is definitely what you've said, but I'll also say that PE is good too because that's what I'm told.

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Byeah207@reddit

Ten years ago in 2016 kids weren't going home to consoles and phones?

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FookinBlinders@reddit

Great comment, cheers for your insight on this! Most of the commenters are talking their experiences in the 90s like it was yesterday.

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DenseRequirements@reddit

Even my lessons in 2000s and 2010s were structured and focused on getting us active than it being an extention of lunchtime on the football pitch. People who are not into sports or don't have an input in the strategic eliment of the games didn't enjoy it while sporty people loved it. In my last couple years of manditaory PE, I saw it as a break from studying and tried to have fun than win everything.

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96JY@reddit

PE was my favourite subject. I don't think it was a waste of time.

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Eukonidor_Of_Arisia@reddit

Even if you cycle at least fifty miles per week, they'll still force you to go out in shorts, in the cold, to play with a ball... Like a dog. Even though the prospect and the logic behind it is clearly based upon low-i.q thinking.

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HunterPrestigious615@reddit

I mean yeah obviously, that’s like saying “even if you do calculus for 20 hours a week, they’ll still force you to sit through maths” It’s part of the curriculum.

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telamalin@reddit

Yeah but why is it *all* ball sports??? Part of the reasons girls are less likely to like PE is that it's all ball sports and boys on average are more into ball sports. There are many forms of dance too! Why is there football, basketball, and tennis, but not equal time spent on ballroom, jazz, and ballet? My daughter likes dance, cheerleading, roller blading and ice skating, cycling, and rock climbing. She hates PE because it does none of that! It's 100% ball sports! Some of those are expensive but i.e. dance requires no extra equipement. If the goal is actually for kids to be fit, yes, ball sports should be an option - but there should be more diversity for kids who aren't into ball sports.

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HunterPrestigious615@reddit

Lots of reasons, one being a lot of schools have seperate classes specifically for dance and secondly dance is borderline of sport/art and even if it is a sport it’s solo for the most part and hard to judge for people who don’t understand it, ball sports have an object rule set that’s easy to follow/score for the teachers and they are always team sports so it’s a lot better for teaching communication teamwork etc whilst also not being a struggle to keep an eye on everyone, then you also have the cultural side, football rugby and cricket are culturally very significant in England, they’re the sports that the nation enjoys the most so it’s important to get people going with them at youth/grass roots level.

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telamalin@reddit

1) Dance is not a solo sport. Like other sports, there is work that can and should be done individually - like practising hoops solo - but typically done in at least couples but typically in groups. 2) Those sports are culturally significant but it doesn't explain why kids do ball sports in general including ones that aren't culturally significant. I suspect the reason that it happens is PE teachers are mostly people who liked ball sports when they were in PE and so they teach it when they become teachers, and they're just self-perpetuating the ball sport thing. If we actually want to make PE a way for all kids to get exercise, it needs to explore more diverse types of physical activity so kids who don't enjoy competitive ball sports.

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HunterPrestigious615@reddit

No it really doesn’t, as explained the other sports are simply bigger in the country we live in and work better for PE at school hence why they’re in the curriculum, you can’t have a system that suits absolutely everyone so obviously you have to appeal to the majority and not the minority.

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telamalin@reddit

40% of kids like football, so it's not the majority. It wouldn't kill that 40% to do something they don't like during PE at least some of the time. I'm not saying get rid of football. I'm saying have more diversity so kids that don't like football get to enjoy exercise too. Including the other half of the population.

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HunterPrestigious615@reddit

No 40% of kids don’t “like” football 40% of kids participate regularly the amount that just enjoy the sport is probably a decent amount higher, again it’s really not a case of what the kids like the best, if that was the case when I was in school we’d have played football every session for the entire of secondary school, the sports you play in PE are the most popular and known sports in the country we live in so that’s why they do them it’s pretty simple, in Japan they do judo in school because it’s one of their sports, in the US they do grid iron football and baseball because it’s the sports their country play, we are exactly the same.

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Eukonidor_Of_Arisia@reddit

It's part of the lowest common denominator, to use a mathematical term.

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

>they'll still force you to go out in shorts, in the cold, Whilst the staff are in track suits.

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plant-strong@reddit

And a steaming cup of tea, the bastard. Fuck you, Mr. Coulson.

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happybaby00@reddit

😂😭

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loafingaroundguy@reddit

Not bald but had a beard.

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Gabbaandcoffee@reddit

It’s probably more important than it ever has been. Cars, convenience, phones and internet has meant people (particularly children) are less fit and walk/ run/ exercise less than ever before. I’ve been a smoker for 25 years and I was more fit than some 15 year olds when I worked in schools. The idea of walking 5 mins to a boxing gym to exercise was too much for some, they would refuse to go if they didn’t get driven there and back…

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LongjumpingPlate6980@reddit

Went to school on the late 90s/ early 00s. Absolutely hated PE. At 38 years old now I’m only 5’0 tall so would have been even shorter back then…and PE for girls was almost always just netball. The sport where height is basically the winner. Those were unfun times for short arses like me. Except in summer when we did athletics. The thought of a high jump still sends shivers through me. The long jump was ok, no one really looked or cared, it wasn’t overtly obvious if you didn’t go far. But the high jump is really fucking obvious when you can’t jump over the bar and you crash into it because you didn’t have a hope in hell of getting anywhere near the top of it. Absolute hell.

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adzpower@reddit

Always just an hour of football. Eventually my PE teacher just gave up because I wasn't interested in playing football for an hour so I'd just walk around the field doing my own thing, he'd tell me to come back and I would reply with a firm "no". And that was that lol.

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AnonymousTimewaster@reddit

PE was a bit of a mixed bag for me. It was fun when I was in the middle set with all my friends, but I ended up getting put in the bottom set with all the losers and suddenly it became an absolutely dire experience. The best times I had were dodgeball when it was everyone of all abilities together just having fun. Summer sports like rounders were okay. As we got older the athletic kids started taking it way more seriously though and stuff like Football got way too competitive considering what we were actually doing.

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connectfourvsrisk@reddit

Some positivity. My youngest child just started secondary school. He missed a large chunk of primary school due to illness and never particularly enjoyed PE as he has dyspraxia. Imagine our surprise to see "Exceeding expectations" on his school report and have him asking if he can take up tennis and cricket! He's also done line dancing which he very much enjoyed. He didn't enjoy swimming but I think that was mostly due to preteen boys mucking about.

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Sad-Ad-694@reddit

I've taught P.E in primary (hated P.E myself). It w

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GhostRiders@reddit

Yes because they are stuck in the 70's.. The obsession with forcing kids who have no interest in playing sports mixing with those who do just creates an incredibly toxic environment. I loved sports, didn't matter if it was Football, Rugby, Cricket, Hockey etc I was very competitive and wanted to win. So when you have young competitive people in the same team as those who have no interest it is always going to end in arguments and those who no interest getting screamed at which just makes them hate sports even more. I got lucky in that half way through High School we got a couple of new PE Teachers who understand stood this. They always separated us into two groups, those who loved sports and those who had little Interest. Those who loved sports needed very little guidance so we just got on with it. As for the other group, they spent much more time with them, they actually taught them about the sport and because of that lack of competition and that they were all at the same level they actually enjoyed it.. This was over 20 years ago yet apparently this thinking is still far too advanced for PE Teachers to comprehend so they still to this day force those who don't like sports to mix with those who do. Absolutely stupid

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Historical_Rain_2960@reddit

PE is the reason nobody wants to be active and fit anymore because they were conditioned to feel insecure about their lack of athletic skill, so they don't even try and get obese.

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yearsofpractice@reddit

Just so I can answer neutrally - did you enjoy or dislike PE? I ask as it’s difficult to tell from your post

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MattWillGrant@reddit

No, most schools have gyms and fitness suites. The range of sports and activities is wider - dance, outdoor ed, orienteering, aerobics.

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SimplyFootballNet@reddit

The PE classes were hit and miss at my school. I was in the school team for hockey and we were the best hockey team in our county. The training, drills, fitness work, facilities, practice matches etc were all frankly amazing. We knew how to play, and had practice the fk out of set plays, passing systems, shooting - all kinds of stuff. We were turning up to matches prepared as hell and we crushed other schools winning games like 15-0 sometimes. But my experience of playing and PE when in classes that were not the actual school teams were really different. Taking the register took 20-minutes, with jobs-worth teachers drilling everyone's gym clothing and if anything was wrong or missing he had to have a waste-of-time conversation about it. Then the actual class was BS. No training or guidance. Just do XYZ for 10-minutes. Then swap to something else. There frankly aren't enough good teachers in this area to make it effective.

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Graz279@reddit

I went to a big state / comprehensive school, was quite good academically but terrible at sport. It seemed the PE teachers had given up on all but the most talented by the final year of school as we were allowed to choose a PE option for sports afternoon one of which was to go ten pin bowling in Southend-on-Sea, and another was to go down the local snooker club for a game. These were obviously the most popular choices 😂 I think ours was the last school year to be allowed to do this, the year below us was a "problem" year and couldn't be trusted to be out of school on their own 😮

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Important-Call6087@reddit

I went to two different public schools - one in Buckinghamshire and one in Devon. In bucks the boys did rugby and football, girls did cross country and netball. I am not a ‘sporty’ guy so I hated and skipped most of this. It was the dread of every week. However when I moved, the Devon PE curriculum was vastly superior and you had a wide range of choice. There were options for gym, trampoline, walking, surfing and the usual football, rugby etc. It made exercise a joy and I found a love for trampolining from it.

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WhatevahMingah@reddit

I’m not sure PE is enough to teach kids how to be healthy. Food is a bigger part of that and I don’t recall school dinners being healthy, especially when compared to other 1st world countries.

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Madruck_s@reddit

Well my sons PE lessons this month are swimming so that seems like a good use of time. He's only 9 too.

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himit@reddit

I wasn't a sporty kid, but PE was always pretty fun tbh. My kids seem to enjoy it too. The primary school also has transition runs - five minute runs between classes, from Year 1, to get the kids out and moving and shift mindset to the next class. (It's a SEN tactic that, like many of them, also do wonders for non-SEN kids.) They also go do short runs with the older kids if they start getting antsy in lessons, so at any given time you walk in you might see a class running two laps around the playground in a line 😂 It works really well for the academics and seems to work well enough for the fitness, too; some of the kids have a bit of puppy fat but I haven't seen an obese kid.

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agathor86_@reddit

I hated PE because it was all football, rugby or athletics. I could run a good 800m on sports day but I was far more into strength sports. I do strongman now. I wish we could have done strength and conditioning in PE, would have been a much better use of my time. At my school, late 90s early 2000s, if you weren't good at football you were a social pariah. I was bullied so much for not being able to play. I found it so boring.

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IamlostlikeZoroIs@reddit

In my school the kids were separated into people that likes sports and those that didn’t. So all the sporty kids played football together and the rest did other things or their own game. I was in the less sporty class and don’t remember much of it other than stretching that I still use almost daily before work.

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haleme@reddit

Left school about 6 years ago. I was an academic and very unsporty kid so in the perfect demographic to hate PE. Overall though I'd say it was fine? Had one or two shitty drill coach teachers but most were decent enough. Quite often they would split up the group based on ability but then they'd often let the shit kids, like me, just fuck about and that was quite fun. The bigger issue for me was having skin problems and body image issues and having to get changed in front of others. But tbh that's probably a wider problem to address. So definitely some shit bits but to be honest that's probably a healthy thing to encounter at that age. Always room for improvements though definitely had a few PE teachers who need anger manager help.

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cvslfc123@reddit

My PE teacher was a prick. I found out recently he was arrested for stalking and breaching a non-molestation order. I guess my feelings about him were correct.

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DaikonContent9554@reddit

I wonder if you still have to be a bit of a bully that couldn't work in a proper sports job to be a PE teacher.

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No_Intern5991@reddit

I absolutely hated it. The teacher was a bell end and it was always the last lesson of the day for me, so I eventually just ended up going home early and skipping it. I still got 98% attendance in that lesson, so the teacher must have just been going through the register and marking everyone as there without checking. He was fucking the geography teacher in the store room though, so maybe he was preoccupied. Edit: I've just checked the website of my old school to see if he's still working there. He's now the headteacher! Talk about falling upwards 😂

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Bran04don@reddit

You nailed the description of my experience 10+ years ago. I doubt it has changed. Seems its always been that way.

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odkfn@reddit

I was big into rugby and played at a fairly high level but my school PE only assessed football and hockey and we had to do written tests on those so I kept doing shit. It was very frustrating to be good at a sport but not the arbitrary sport they chose.

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Affectionate_You_858@reddit

Crazy, for GCSE PE we picked 8 different sports to do over 2 years, you were assessed on them all then they took the top 4 marks as your practical score which made up 50% of your overall. The you had coursework for 25% and an exam for the final 25%

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jamesdownwell@reddit

I loved PE throughout my entire time at school life over multiple PE teachers. I wasn’t very good at sports but I always enjoyed PE. Maybe you just had shit teachers. There were one or two kids at school that had an aversion to _any_ physical activity but that was most certainly a them problem, they behaved like spoiled brats if I’m honest.

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ClimoCustomGuitars@reddit

PE teaches you important things early Teamwork Fitness Stretching Coordination

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GigsworthCB@reddit

I read this report. They are considering banning focaccia bread in school. It has to be the single most out of touch thing I’ve ever read!

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jaydaymay@reddit

It is interesting to hear that people born later have typically better experiences in PE - I left secondary school in the late 2010's and PE felt like hell on earth. It was like a humiliation ritual for those who were not sporty, with most of my negative memories of school stemming from PE lessons.

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Affectionate_You_858@reddit

This is how it was in all school lessons, not just PE. people who struggle get battered

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hhfugrr3@reddit

My kid did ping pong in PE yesterday. I'm sure it was fun, but I doubt it did much to get the kids moving as much as football or rugby etc etc

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MarcusH26051@reddit

I'm a sports nerd with absolutely zero ability to play 😂 Severe dyspraxia made Rugby,Tennis, Badminton, Hockey and Gymnastics really really hard but the teachers did try to work with me to find ways to make it work , serving under arm was okay to them because they knew the chance of me being able to serve properly was tiny. Getting the ball/shuttle over the net was enough for them. I'm a huge cricket fan , I'll sit there and happily watch games live but give me a bat and I have no idea what I'm doing , I've just not got the hand to eye co-ordination for anything like that.

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HeadBat1863@reddit

Got a child who’s just started at secondary school. They hate PE, despite having previously played youth football. Can’t believe schools are still forcing children undergoing changes to change and shower in front of everyone.

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Jack_Kegan@reddit

I really enjoyed and was good at academics. What really irritated me was this weird divide of how schools teach academics and sport. If a maths teacher shouted at a student because they were bad at maths and forced them to (in front of everyone) struggle to do 100 equations they would be struck off. However, if in sport you struggled to do something they’d just make you do push ups in front of everyone and that was taken as fine. I wasn’t always good at English but I ended up with teachers that really helped me and I got a good grade. In sports, no teacher ever actually tried to get me to improve. It feels exactly like you describe and I am younger than you.

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bannanawaffle13@reddit

When I was in school, teachers didn't give across, they just put us on a football pitch and told us to run around, us less sporty kids were allowed to do what we want while the sporty kids did their thing, I'm 6 foot and DENSE so I loved rugby (it once took 8 people to drag me down due to poor tackling technique, the pile on was not fun though) but we rarely did it because it just became a mass brawl, I think PE teachers are just lazy TBH, they only teach at GCSE and a level and even then it isn't like teaching algebra, it would be so much better to have fitness and nutrition lessons, but I wouldn't trust a lot of them to teach it TBH.

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stowgood@reddit

Was it really bad 20 years ago or do you mean 30? 20 years ago PE lessons I observed as a trainee teacher what feels like a lifetime ago were fantastic, they went into real depth about heart rate zones and diet and stuff. Maybe it depends massively on the school? I think if you do it as a gcse or whatever that will be nowadays it's a lot better.

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Realistic-River-1941@reddit

My neice is apparently allowed to sit out PE because it is damaging to her mental health and self-esteem. I thought that was the whole point of PE... Her dad is happy, because she does running in her own time, and he knows school would totally kill her interest in it.

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TheTjalian@reddit

I really hope so. My issue with PE was that unlike academic classes where you were actually taught things to get better at them, in PE you're basically assumed to know how to play football and rugby and if you don't know then just wander about and try to score. I never got to learn the tactical side of sports (like positions and formations) and most of all I was never really coached on how to get fitter. None of my family really knew either. I'd like to see PE focus more on personal fitness rather than "let's just play sport for fun".

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Important_Ruin@reddit

Only thing hated was rugby and bloody dance. Rugby as its a shit sport that I've got no interest in, it was always done when it was cold and damp, teacher would be wrapped up in their thick coat and gloves shouting 'its not cold lads, your get hands out your shirts, you cant catch the ball'

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WhalingSmithers00@reddit

10-20 years ago is 2006-2016. You're making it sound like Kes. That was peak 'participation' trophy time

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practicalcabinet@reddit

I remember that we had a lot of lessons where they would teach us actual stuff like how to do a ruck, how to do a tennis serve, how to throw a basketball near a net, and how to use some of those weight contraptions. But we did also have a fair few 'lessons' where I would hang out near my team's goal and chat to the other 'defender' and the goalie, and occasionally kick a ball away from us if the actually sporty lads on our team let it through.

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eivoooom@reddit

I was in bottom set for secondary school and what was the biggeet problem was that we'd play a sport we did the year before but everytime it was learn thebasics everytime, then for the last lesson we'd actually play the sport properly, it was boring, we'd benefit from playing properly earlier to be honest.

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this-guy-@reddit

PE taught me really useful stuff. self defence skills. Go on bro. Just try throwing a medicine ball at me. I'll catch it. No problem. Then what are you gonna do when I throw it right back at you?

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Heavy-Locksmith-3767@reddit

I wasn't the most athletic kid but our PE program was actually pretty good in hindsight. This was early 2000s. In middle school we did lots of track and field events - races up to 1500m, shot put, javelin, long jump and high jump. In high school we did rugby and tennis, swimming and a good section on the gym, teaching us about exercises and programming.

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asjonesy99@reddit

Think it’s on the teachers really. In my high school the PE teachers largely left the sporty kids to do whatever and focused on encouraging the others. One such memory being swimming where the teacher essentially just told everyone to do lengths whilst he focused on teaching the kids who didn’t really know how to swim, featuring at the end of term the newly swimming kids showing everyone how they could now too swim lengths which could have gone horribly but everyone was buzzing for them.

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Impressive-Cheek1609@reddit

Went to pick up my teenage niece after school last year and decided to go early and walk my dog around the public park next to the school. PE at her school involved little groups of teenagers in regular uniform, walking about. One or two were actually in PE kit and running, but a lot were ambling along in clouds of vape fumes. It's a big park, they were out of the teacher's eyeline. I asked my niece if that was normal and she confirmed it was.

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I_ALWAYS_UPVOTE_CATS@reddit

Either you were unlucky or I was lucky. At my state school in the late 00s, they actually did teach general fitness strategies, including the distinction between exercising for strength and exercising for muscle mass. The sports were obviously not everyone's cup of tea, and of course not everyone enjoyed it to the same degree, but as long as you were joining in and having a go, the teachers were satisfied and it wasn't a problem if you weren't very good.

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MaltedMilkBiscuits10@reddit

I was always called lazy, never put any effort in, never took anything seriously. Id be shouted at for never hitting the ball during tennis, never catching a rugby ball. I lacked enthusiasm and lacked effort. Those words always stuck with me after reading my school report. The same was said for music, I lacked coordination, ample opportunity to improve, need to put effort in. it wasn't until a special needs teacher covered a English lesson and observed me struggling with my handwriting and reading. She later invited me to a informal assessment which involved making things, writing and talking about my life in general, how did I find tying laces, doing up buttons etc She referred me to much more in-depth testing which involved a lot of coordination tasks. Turns out in the final weeks of year 11, I was diagnosed with a moderately severe form of dyspraxia and a moderate form of dyslexia. It was a light bulb moment for everyone, oh he has a issue with coordination, ahhh that be it. Failed by primary school, my secondary school and my parents just brushed it off as me being slow. Realistically, year 7-9 I did mostly cross country just to opt for people not to take the piss. Year 10 and 11 pe was always before lunch so just made a quick bee line for the gate and had an extended lunch at the local chippy.

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Consistent-Pirate-23@reddit

My school was basically the second you were human and therefore not amazingly talented at something, you were basically pond life to whichever subject’s teacher. P.E was awful, then again Drama gave it a good run for its money, I was pretty good at it but my teacher hated me because I wanted to write scripts when I was like 14. All these years on I have had more books published than her, so ha

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Nemariwa@reddit

My nephews are both secondary school age now but did a wide range of activities including regular yoga at primary so the emphasis seems to have moved on from making kids run laps until they are sick. They also did active forest school type lessons where they were learning on their feet. At secondary school year 9 and up have access to a proper gym with support on how to use equipment safely and effectively. Neither seem to have inherited my absolute hatred of exercise forged from a mixture of dodgy genetics, my sadistic PE teachers and having parents who actively encouraged me to disrespect the teacher/lesson because of the sadist perves who taught them.

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FlaviousTiberius@reddit (OP)

> At secondary school year 9 and up have access to a proper gym with support on how to use equipment safely and effectively. Thats actually a great idea, I honestly wish this had been a thing back in my day. There was a gym at ours but it was absolute wank and the PE teachers never bothered to show anyone how to use the stuff properly. Though my school was also a pretty deprived one so I doubt it's much better these days.

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HachiTofu@reddit

The one thing I remember about PE is the insistence of learning how to do a forward roll and being ridiculed for not being able to. Then there was the insistence of making everyone do gymnastics, which to me, a chubby guy with fuck all balance, just seemed like the best way to break your neck. Thats if you ever got the chance to after breaking your neck and spine doing the forward roll.

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Apsalar28@reddit

My nephew's experience sounds a lot more positive than mine was. At their school they do a different sport or activity every 1/2 term and they are sorted into sets. The kids get to pick which set they are in for each sport so the star of the school football team can be in the bottom group when it's tennis for 6 weeks and as well as competitive sports they'll do 6 weeks in the gym occasionally.

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tiny-brit@reddit

I left school 10 years ago - 90% our PE "lessons" consisted of playing either dodgeball or rounders, and 90% of the time we had student teachers on placement who didn't know how to control a class of teenagers or actually conduct a lesson. And teenage boys playing dodgeball - they throw the balls so forcefully it's actually dangerous. So the girls cowered in the corner too scared to participate. I would hope that's not a standard experience. On the very rare occasion that we did something else like a gym workout, badminton, basketball, rugby, or girls and boys did separate activities, it was actually enjoyable.

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ShockingHair_63@reddit

I taught PE until recently, and to be honest I think it has got less useful. We didn’t work them hard at all, no one built fitness, it wasn’t taken seriously. When I started teaching decades ago I worked in a few schools where PE was taken extremely seriously. Very intense and the classes genuinely made students fitter, and everyone had to give multiple sports a try, no excuses. That approach won’t work for everyone, but it’s better than the half hearted approach that seems more common today. Setting classes based on ability is important to make them effective.

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Mr06506@reddit

My kids secondary don't set by ability across the board, even things like maths or French. That said, PE is mostly great by all accounts, the only thing that annoys me, almost every week some lesson or club or fixture is cancelled for ordinary kids because the staff are taking some super sports star to some competition. This bothers me mostly for Tennis and Gymnastics where they clearly got good at expensive out of school clubs and now the school is just muscling in on their success.

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Yawate97@reddit

I loved PE. It was the best thing about school

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ClassroomDowntown664@reddit

I was born in 03 in my primary pe was just about burning of energy in multiple ways . I also remember from primary being made to slow dance like we were on strictly and learning not how to swim . in secondary we did core skills . we also spent a half term in the gym. we were slipt sporty girls and boys then the left overs .

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Fantastic_Picture384@reddit

I enjoyed sports.... just like some people enjoyed cookery.. science.. etc etc

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No-Problem-1354@reddit

I didn’t have this experience at all. Group sport was generally something that you signed up for in my school. So I was in the netball team and the hockey team and I also did tag rugby sometimes as well. PE classes we sometimes did group activities but it was generally things like rounders, we also used gym equipment, we did athletics, cross country. I enjoyed PE.

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Alive_Forever_9541@reddit

I'm 50. 35 years ago in my council-run secondary school, on a council estate, the sports I did were: The normal football, rugby, cricket, cross country. But also, climbing, orienteering,, squash, basketball, badminton, tennis, swimming, canoeing, croquet! (Yes, really - I still randomly remember: the words Roque, Croque and Continuation). When my kids were in secondary school 5 years ago they didn't have quite the range of stuff I did. But it was far more structured and were supported with professional football coaching, had access to all the Duke of Edinburgh Award stuff. Didn't have squash courts, but still had climbing, badminton, basketball etc. So I don't relate to the question "it it the same waste of time". I think you must have just been in a school or region which didn't support or prioritise sports and physical education.

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Dissidant@reddit

I went in the 90's and found it pretty shit, they had access to a massive field with multiple pitches but only allowed the main teams representing the school to practice on it. The only consolation was the field was good for running Best stuff was outside of school IMO. Plenty of choice and cost peanuts so even if you were less well off it was accessible. Youth club for 20p (which borrowed a gym for indoor sports i.e. footie, basketball, hockey etc) Swimming pool 20p, boxing gym a quid and so on I look at it now, with how much people are forking over for extra curricular stuff and I'm just grateful to have grown up in the time I did because alot of that stuff isn't around anymore or you are priced out

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miggleb@reddit

Can't imagine they're still having kids who forgot their kit run around in their bills

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Fuzzy_Cantaloupe6353@reddit

The idea is good. They do a good mix of things but it's like twice a week for less than an hour by the time kids are changed and then obviously have to change back. It's a pointless endeavour really but there's no real time in the week for it anymore

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