WAG PE waivers/alternatives?

[cbifoja]

Once I realized that PE was more than just physical activity, it became an easier pill for me to swallow. I found out that they are expected to learn the rules of so many different games as well as the physical fitness part.

I'm still not a fan but I can live with it. And like so many others have said, it's an easy A with little to no homework in an environment DD will excel in.

 

[Rapunzel]

Is the hour a real hour or does it include getting ready/prep/set up/changing back to school clothes?
Here in primary schools the hour PE slot is only about 20mins of activity by the time everything else that has to happen, has happened.

 

[Quadqueen]

No PE waivers here, either. I'm with the others who said their DDs would never want to miss PE. Slightly off topic, but your DD is 9 and doing 20+ hours a week at level 6?! That seems excessively high. Presuming her hours only go up from there (!), what do you plan to do if you don't get a PE waiver in the years to come? To be honest though, I wouldn't worry so much about the hour of PE - like others have said, it's not like it's an hour of physical activity. I'd be more worried about excessive hours at the gym.

 

[Sasha]

No PE waivers here, either. I'm with the others who said their DDs would never want to miss PE. Slightly off topic, but your DD is 9 and doing 20+ hours a week at level 6?! That seems excessively high. Presuming her hours only go up from there (!), what do you plan to do if you don't get a PE waiver in the years to come? To be honest though, I wouldn't worry so much about the hour of PE - like others have said, it's not like it's an hour of physical activity. I'd be more worried about excessive hours at the gym.

Don't mean to turn this into an hours thread, but 20 hours is pretty standard for early optionals in our area. But we top out at 24 hours for upper optionals, though, so it won't go up too much.

We also don't have a PE waiver, so DD(9) has 4 days of PE (2.5 hours total per week) at a public school, followed by 4 hours of gym every day (5 days) right after school. I did speak with her teacher, though, and she seems willing to potentially be flexible with letting my DD sit out if she feels like it, or catch up on homework. So far, DD does not wish to miss PE(!), favoring using part of recess to get a little extra homework in (this option is available daily to all students).

 

[duyetanh]

Interestingly enough, my dd disliked p.e...just wasn't into it. Said it was boring waiting around for the teacher to quell behavior, and she froze outside, because they weren't allowed to take their jackets. Kids cheated at the games, and she got pushed around for being so small. Also, being a pleaser, she would try to work hard at it...but still be freezing. She is happy to be missing it this year.

 

[vbdb]

There's no waiver here in Canada but I wouldn't even consider asking either of my DDs from being exempted. It's just grade school gym class, these kids have so much energy they handle it just fine. Ours have gym at least three times a week for 45 mins-1 hr plus Daily physical activity as mandated by the provincial government. My kids have never complained, except on Dodgeball days, they hate dodgeball

 

[Deleted member 17723]

Can't really help - just a comment. Schools are making gym such a big deal. Honestly, most kids at my school don't even participate. I missed half of a gym class the other day due to getting hit in the head hard mid game (so I had to get imPACT tested), and now I have to write an essay about soccer and make up that gym class within 2 weeks. Wow. Gym is one of two classes that you have to take every year....

 

[catova]

I agree; I think daily required PE is the government's attempt to teach kids a healthy lifestyle and sadly, I've never see PE come close to doing that if a healthy lifestyle is not practiced in the home, or if the parents do not provide sports/exercise opportunities to their children outside of school. I'm pretty sure my kid who is in gym for 20 hours a week already plus on a soccer team is getting the message that regular participation in physical activity is valued by our family.

I have personally seen some of my DD's PE classes where half the kids were dragging their feet, make no effort to actually play any activities competitively, etc. Maybe it's age related (she's in 7th gr) but now there's plenty of kids who don't want to work up a sweat or mess up their hair, are too self conscious to put effort into it because they don't want their lack of athletic ability to be front and center, or otherwise use PE time to act out behaviorally. So, yeah, so much for good clean fun at PE. My older DD experienced the same thing in middle school at a different school. Also, it's just not a priority to me for her to be taught sports' rules as part of the academic day (she is well versed in many sports already, but even if she were not, is it that important in our sports crazy culture for her to know the rules of badminton?). Also, DD is a very fast runner and generally good at sports...so when she'd come in first in the mile or otherwise did well at whatever game they were learning, there'd be comments about her size (the comments range from 'yeah, you run fast because you're the size of a 3rd grader...or the opposite 'can't believe some as small as you can run so fast').

I think half the parents want PE so their kids get some energy out before coming home, which is understandable...I certainly appreciate that about PE when it comes to my younger son, for whom 3 outside sports is still not enough to quell his energy level. But sometimes, I feel we lose sight of the forest for the trees. If the goal of PE is to 'give opportunities to learn motor skills, develop fitness and gain understanding about physical activity and its' benefits'...well, I think that can be covered without requiring PE for 12 years depending on the child. I prefer the school shows that it considers the whole child by seeing that for some, those few extra hours a week to do school work instead of PE are much more beneficial to a student's academic growth and physical well being.

 

[kimute]

Thank you for all the great replies! Interesting mix of gymnasts and parents either wanting PE or not.

I hear from some of you the benefits of PE and will think about that. If we end up with PE, I'll look at the bright side. Right now for this kid, I think resting, reading and schoolwork are higher priority than learning other sports/social stuff.

I explained the details of DDs training, and my DDs anguish, to teacher/principal/PE teacher. I now have a meeting this week with the PE teacher to talk about a "differentiated PE plan for DD during the season". If only gymnasts had seasons... I'll let you know what that means and how it goes!

Thanks everyone for your support.

PS Love the visual of my DD arm wrestling the principal. I'd put all my money on DD.

 

[rjb123]

My DD does not do PE as of this year. Honestly, for her it is a waste, and after observing some of the activities they do (running races in socks on a gym floor! Sack races on a slippery gym floor!) I just went to the principal and got her excused. Luckily for us, it was not an issue- they are very aware of the amount of training she does, and were happy to accommodate. FWIW, DD's ortho was the first person to put the bug in my ear that she should not be doing PE. He told me that a HUGE percentage of his work was due to PE related injuries- the classes tend to be over crowded, poorly supervised and lead to lots of broken bones.

 

[SurpriseGymMom]

Still no word on whether my younger DD (the gymmie) will end up being excused from PE or not (we won't know until spring semester schedule comes out) but as a side note I just signed my older Dds (dancer) waiver today. It took her less than a month, until Sept 27th, to fulfill the hours needed for the semester..!

 

[FloMoGymMom]

We are in DFW, TX area. My DD is in middle school and her school district offers "External PE" for athletes like this. Her gymnastics coach grades her and sends the grade to the school.

Doing External PE also grants her early release from school on the days her would have had PE, which gives her extra time to keep up with her regular classes.

I am also homeschooling her Fine Arts credit, so she gets early release on the days they don't have PE.

Without this program she would be late to gym, 1 hour, every day.

The homeschooling came about via a chat directly with her Principal when I was researching alternatives. The principal recommended Texas Tech ISD which is a homeschool ISD.

Texas is quite liberal with their homeschooling though and I don't think CA is. But it wouldn't hurt to check. Maybe ask if her gymnastics coach could grade her for PE?