The essay below is a guest post by a young friend of mine. In our reflections on Christian physicality, we frequently forget to think specifically about the implications of the fact that schoolchildren have bodies. Owen weighs in with a message we’d do well to reflect on.
School of Play
by Owen Coffman
Angela Browning, founder of Recess for All Florida Students, said her kids started coming home from school in tears a few years ago, complaining that the day had been too long and that they’d had no time to play with friends. At the time, they were getting 10 minutes of recess twice a week, she said. This year, with 20 minutes of recess each day, their response has been different. Health organizations including the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend that children should be given at least 60 minutes of recess per day. Why do kids get such a minimal amount of time to do what they want? Nobody questions the fact that adults need breaks during a work day. Kids have far more energy, less developed brains, and haven’t yet built the social skills they will need to thrive as adults. It is intuitive that they would need free time to move, think, play, and interact with their peers. School is very structured. Kids have to sit quietly, take notes, and keep their bodies still. In most classes, they are spending their time listening, not contributing. Interacting with friends is discouraged. Obviously these rules are in place for a reason, intending to help students learn. Teachers are urged to give their students all the information needed to pass their standardized tests, keep their schools open, and measure up to students in other countries academically. This in turn puts pressure on students to keep their grades up, remember everything, and ultimately succeed. However, kids are only able to keep these difficult behaviors up for a time before they need a break to move their bodies, interact with friends, or even just sit alone and think. Many school officials and administrators downplay the importance of recess for kids because they assume it is a waste of time and kids would be better employed studying. They often feel that a few extra minutes spent teaching a subject will improve academic outcomes more than the same amount of time spent in unstructured play. However, this is not actually what the research has shown. Children get higher grades, solve personal problems better, improve their fitness, and develop confidence and independence, all as direct benefits of longer recess.
Maybe the most obvious to spot are the physical benefits of recess. According to US News and World Report, “The average (American) child sits for 8.5 hours a day. Combine that with high-calorie foods, and weight gain is inevitable, researchers say. But studies show that at least 20 minutes of recess daily, along with 150 minutes of physical education a week, make a measurable difference in children’s weight.” In a country where children’s obesity rates are growing, implementing recess could have a big impact. In the same article, author Kate Rix points out “Letting kids run fast will help them develop coordination. Running up the slide may not be as unsafe as it looks. And even falling… is something kids need to practice to avoid getting badly hurt.” Challenging their physical abilities makes kids stronger, faster, more coordinated, and improves stamina. Recess isn’t the only way to reap all of these benefits, but it is a good place to start. Students will feel motivated to improve in an environment with friends. Most boys and many girls are naturally competitive with each other and physical activities are a better place for kids to compete than on video game scores, social media followers, or test results. Pull up competitions, jump rope high score, or a game of capture the flag are all appropriate outlets for competitive spirit. Aside from being a channel for kids to burn energy and compete, games at recess are an opportunity to try out new things. Children often lack space, time, or friends after school which leaves recess as their only time to be introduced to new things and expand what they are able to do. A child who throws a frisbee with a friend for 20 minutes will find he can throw more accurately and catch more consistently than when he began. A kid who sets herself a goal of getting across the monkey bars without dropping will get stronger arms and be able to complete the monkey bars, climb a rope swing, or in my brother’s case, climb up the underside of the stairs using only his arms. When kids get home from school, without motivation, they may just pick up a screen. Many parents don’t require or encourage their children to be active when they get home from school, which means it is often up to schools to provide them with a place to be active and grow in physical ability.
“Quality physical education along with daily recess are necessary components of the school curriculum that enable students to develop physical competence, health-related fitness, self responsibility, and enjoyment of physical activity so that they can be physically active for a lifetime,” the groups wrote in a position paper about elementary school recess in 2001.(Time Magazine) Not only do schools enforce activity in PE class, they can be the place where kids find movement fun during recess. There is something inherently more exciting about playing and competing with people your age. Classmates can build each other up, have friendly competition, and enable games that can’t be played at home due to lack of space, equipment, or teammates.
Learning a skill at a young age and enjoying it will build a foundation for wanting to do it for the rest of life. A young kid whose dad takes him golfing will be more likely to golf as an older adult to stay in shape and have fun. Kids who play tennis in middle school might as a fifty year old pick up pickleball.
The physical benefits of recess are all pretty obvious, but what about the social upshots of a longer unstructured time for children during a normal school day? Everything about school is precisely structured. Kids aren’t able to interact with each other except for during recess. Children will grow in independence and toughness, learn how to regulate themselves emotionally, solve conflicts with peers, socialize, and develop teamwork skills during recess. Knowing how to socialize is important for all kids and it is impossible to learn in a class.
Recess helps kids develop independence and toughness. Inevitably, kids get minor injuries like scrapes and bruises playing outside during recess and have to learn how to get back up. Kids don’t want to miss recess and most will want to keep playing even if they are in pain, so they have an incentive to get back up and keep playing. Kids often encourage each other to push through minor pain so they can finish a game. During recess, children are supervised but less closely than indoors. They usually get to make choices about what to play and are allowed to devise their own rules for a game. This might be the only time in a weekday that kids get to choose what they want to do, and practicing these skills at recess leads to greater confidence and independence. Kids will also gain confidence when they discover that they are growing in a particular skill. A kid who doubled the length of his frisbee throw can feel elated and proud of his accomplishment. The girl who jumps ropes at recess and learns how to touch the ground between jumps and retain her balance will feel more confident to try other tricks with her rope.
Independence and toughness are not the only social benefits of longer recess. Students also learn how to interact with their peers, practice getting along, and regulate their own emotions during recess. This is the time that kids are free to choose something they want to do in their time. Without a teacher hovering over them to make sure everyone follows the rules, they have the chance to learn to cooperate and compromise. There is an incentive to do so because very few kids would have fun spending time sitting alone. When you want someone to play with you or do something with you, you normally try to find common ground that suits both. Kids might try to be nice to someone to encourage them to play. For all these same reasons, kids have a motivation to learn to control their temper. It’s not fun to play with someone who will blow up at the slightest problem. Kids instinctively understand that and will try to maintain calm in order to have fun with their classmates or finish a game.
“Asking other kids to play, explaining the rules of a complex game and hashing out disputes are all important life lessons that kids can only learn if they’re given time to play. Recess also offers the chance for children to strengthen their leadership and negotiation skills, and it can prevent bullying. Kids love playing—and when a conflict arises, it pushes children to practice these vital social skills so they can get back to having fun.” (Rasmussen University) Teamwork is a vital part of adult life and it is a skill best learned at a young age. According to Robert Murray, the former chairman of the American Academy of Pediatrics Council on School Health “Recess is the only place in school, maybe the only place in their social life, where kids have the opportunity to develop social skills with their peers,” These social skills are of utmost importance at every stage of life from getting along at work, making new friends, and being part of a community. “When you think about adults, we value and treasure those social skills in our coworkers – things like negotiation and the ability to communicate and have peer-to-peer interaction as a team member,” he also said. “All of those things are really worked out on the playground peer-to-peer, not teacher-to-child, not parent-to-child, but child-to-child.” Loosely supervised play time might be the only time for kids to develop lifelong skills relevant throughout their entire adult lives. In other words, you hope your coworkers had recess growing up.
When kids get to move their bodies, another result is better attention in the classroom. “After recess for children, or after a corresponding break time for adolescents, students are more attentive and better able to perform cognitively,” says the American Academy of Pediatrics. When students get a break from staring at a textbook or listening to a teacher, they will come back to the subject with improved attention. This actually allows them to accomplish more than if they had studied the whole time. The AAP policy statement goes on to state “The science shows pretty clearly that taking those breaks in the day makes students better able to encode memory and learn and perform academically.” Students will not only be able to focus better in the classroom, but will be able to remember and recall what they have learned. If encoding memory, learning, and academic performance are the fundamental goals of education in America, recess is a critical tool to help educators achieve their purpose. The strange thing is, one of the reasons recess is getting cut from many schools across America is because of government regulations. Recess times across the country began to decline rapidly after the No Child Left Behind Act, which was designed to help American kids keep up academically with those of other nations. In this policy, the government installed achievement goals in standardized tests. If a school’s test scores were poor, they would be subject to a series of penalties, including loss of funding. It is no wonder that schools began to question whether recess was a waste of time. Yet, research shows that kids who get more recess perform at a higher level in school. Statistics aside, be honest, would you feel mentally refreshed if you spent hours sitting in a classroom without a break? American kids simply do not get enough time for recess, which is critical for their improvement in fitness and coordination, development of social skills, and success in school. The physical benefits of recess are immense. Kids will gain endurance, strength, and coordination while learning to enjoy new activities. While socializing and developing teamwork, they will build independence and toughness. Kids need a mental break, and when they don’t get it, they lose their attention span, forget their lessons, have difficulty concentrating resulting in lower grades. By giving students the opportunity to use their bodies and change their focus, teachers actually improve memory, recall, and attention in the classroom. Following the recommendations for recess will improve student outcomes and allow schools to meet the standards necessary to succeed. Perhaps most importantly, recess is vital for kids because they will learn skills that they are not learning anywhere else. In short, recess is the necessary preparation for successful life as an adult. It helps people grow into all the skills needed to live a productive, happy life later on. Teamwork, cooperation, and compromise are necessary skills for working with others. Enjoyment of a variety of physical activities will develop hobbies and fitness for later in life. And intellectual achievement will lay the groundwork for success in college, on-the-job training, and the continued education needed to make an enjoyable career. So come on you all, give ‘em some RECESS.
Works Cited
Reilly, Katie “Is Recess Important for Kids or a Waste of Time? Here’s What the Research Says” Time Magazine 23 October 2017 time.com/4982061/recess-benefits-research-debate Date Accessed 13 April 2025
Rix, Kate. “How Much Recess Should Kids Get?” US News World Report 14 October 2022. www.usnews.com/education/k12/articles/how-much-recess-should-kids-get Date Accessed 15 April 2025
“10 Reasons Kids Should Have Longer Recess at School” Recess Guardians 25 March 2022 www.recessguardians.org/post/design-a-stunning-blog Date Accessed 15 April 2025
Potts, Monica “Recess is Good for Kids. Why Don’t More States Require It?” Five Thirty Eight 23 March 2023 fivethirtyeight.com/features/recess-is-good-for-kids-why-dont-more-states-require-it Date Accessed 16 April 2025
Thompson, Hannah R. and London, Rebecca A. “Not All Fun and Games: Disparities in School Recess Persist, and Must Be Addressed” National Library of Medicine pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10319329 Date Accessed 9 April 2025
Murray, Robert et All. “The Crucial Role of Recess in School” American Academy of Pediatrics Volume 131, Issue 1. 1 January 2013. publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/131/1/183/30893/The-Crucial-Role-of-Recess-in-School? Date Accessed 13 April 2025
Brooks, Ashley. “The Importance of Recess: Why Schools Need More Playtime” Rasmussen University 20 June 2022 www..rasmussen.edu/degrees/education/blog/importance-of-recess Date Accessed 14 April 2025
“Recess Helps Kids Learn Better in School” American Heart Association 29 January 2016 www.heart.org/en/news/2018/05/01/recess-helps-kids-learn-better-in-school Date Accessed 12 April 2025
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