Physical Activity in Physical Education: Are Longer Lessons Better?

Increasing moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA) is a public health priority.1 Regular participation is associated with healthy growth and development and prevention of chronic health conditions.2 Guidelines recommend children and adolescents engage in at least 60 minutes of MVPA every day including vigorous, muscle building, and bone strengthening activities 3 times per week.3 Unfortunately, by high school (HS), less than one-third meet guidelines every day.4 Schools can help by offering physical education (PE),5,6 the only program in the formalized K-12 curriculum whose primary goals include engaging in MVPA, developing motor skills, and teaching about the importance of leading an active lifestyle. PE is especially important for the least active students because it is the only place where they can experience PA at higher intensities.7 Additionally, PE is essential for students who do not play sports, who live in communities that do not offer programming, or whose families lack resources related to transportation, time, money.8,9 Despite the nearly 2 decades of public health support, student PE enrollment requirements have diminished in the United States (US).9 No federal law requires PE and few schools offer it daily.10 Adding further compromise is that 65% of states allow students to substitute involvement in other extracurricular programs like athletics, band, cheerleading, debate, and ROTC to fulfill PE requirements.10 As a result, few receive PE daily.4,10 Therefore, optimizing PA accrual in PE is critical. In a recent review, McKenzie and Lounsbery9 identified numerous barriers that prevent PE from playing a greater role in providing and promoting PA, including those associated with the structural delivery of PE: PE facilities (amenities, size, and location), teacher credentials, class size, equipment to student ratio, scheduled lesson length and the number of lessons provided per week. There is a paucity of evidence that guides any aspect of PE’s structural delivery in schools. Even the National Association for Sport and Physical Education’s (NASPE) recommended minutes for PE are not based on evidence, but instead are an artifact of advocating for daily PE based on traditional lesson schedule structures in elementary (30 minutes X 5 days = 150 minutes of recommended PE) and secondary (50 minutes X 5 = 225 minutes of recommended PE per week) school settings. In California, the site of this study, all schools offering grades 7–12 are mandated to provide at least 400 minutes of PE instruction every 10 days.11 School administrators have the ability to control how instructional minutes are scheduled from day-to-day. Most adopt a traditional schedule, meaning students attend all classes Monday-Friday. However, some administrators elect to employ a modified block schedule wherein students spend a longer period of time in classes on some days of the week. To date, no study has examined associations between modified block versus traditional schedules and PA related outcomes in PE. Understanding associations between schedule type and PA outcomes in PE has important implications for guiding school leader’s decision making. Specifically, it would be helpful to understand if offering a modified block schedule leads to greater MVPA accrual in PE. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to compare PA related outcomes in PE lessons from schools using a traditional versus modified block schedule.