No More Relaxation

(By Andrew MacKie-Mason)

According to the New York Times, schoolchildren have a new worst enemy: structured recess.

Gone are the days of relaxation at recess. It's no longer the time to unwind a bit in the middle of a stressful day.

At Broadway Elementary School here, there is no more sitting around after lunch. No more goofing off with friends. No more doing nothing.

Instead there is Brandi Parker, a $14-an-hour recess coach with a whistle around her neck, corralling children behind bright orange cones to play organized games. There she was the other day, breaking up a renegade game of hopscotch and overruling stragglers’ lame excuses.

When I was in elementary school, we had a word for "a...coach with a whistle around her neck, corralling children behind bright orange cones to play organized games." It was gym class. It was certainly not recess. Recess is one of the few times left in the school day for children to be themselves. It allows them to play make believe, create their own games, and interact with their peers without an adult telling them how to do it. It stimulates creativity and reminds kids that there's more to life than endless structure.

The article lists some supposed benefits of this structured recess. This one struck me as the most ridiculous: "The school is one of a growing number across the country that are reining in recess to...foster social skills." Since when has structuring recess fostered social skills? It is more of the classroom: it teaches kids how to interact when there is an adult supervising them. It doesn't give kids any chance to develop real social skills: how to interact with their peers of their own accord.

This quote from the article sums up perfectly what's wrong with structured recess:

Dr. Romina M. Barros, an assistant clinical professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx who was an author of a widely cited study on the benefits of recess, published last year in the journal Pediatrics, says that children still benefit most from recess when they are let alone to daydream, solve problems, use their imagination to invent their own games and “be free to do what they choose to do.”

Structured recess, Dr. Barros said, simply transplants the rules of the classroom to the playground.

“You still have to pay attention,” she said. “You still have to follow rules. You don’t have that time for your brain to relax.”

The response by pro-structure advocates?

...the recess coaches used a playbook with hundreds of games and gave students a say in what they do.

“It’s not rigid in any way, and it certainly allows for their creativity,”

Oh really? That's modern creativity, apparently: the ability to make a choice among options. To be fair, there are some legitimately positive outcomes of the structured recess program:

Broadway Elementary brought in Ms. Parker in January out of exasperation with students who, left to their own devices, used to run into one another, squabble over balls and jump-ropes or monopolize the blacktop while exiling their classmates to the sidelines. Since she started, disciplinary referrals at recess have dropped by three-quarters, to an average of three a week. And injuries are no longer a daily occurrence.

“Before, I was seeing nosebleeds, busted lips, and students being a danger to themselves and others,” said Alejandro Echevarria, the principal. “Now, Coach Brandi does miracles with 20 cones and three handballs.”

Still, if fights and exclusion are the real issue, there are much less drastic ways to deal with it than a structured recess. For instance, the coach could be hired to supervise instead of direct, and to draw in the kids who really need it rather than the kids who enjoy the time to be in their own world. Of course, that would take a more skillful person than it takes to simply lead kids by the nose...

This quote sums up the two opinions, I think:

Kazmir Payne, a second grader, wishes he could have his free time back, but his mother, Kizzy, appreciates the more regimented recess.

“It’s better this way because that’s how other kids get hurt, when you’re horse-playing,” she said. “I think the more supervision, the better.”

Kids want the chance to be themselves. Adults don't trust them and think they know what the kids should be doing better than the kids do.