We are talking about the master schedule for next year. In the state of Texas, the kids are supposed to have 135 minutes of PE per week. I have been very fortunate that for the past 12 years I have been at my school, I have been scheduled to have an entire grade level at a time every day. So my kids have been scheduled for 225 minutes of PE a week. Our older kids rarely get recess time on the playground but they are getting 45 minutes with me every morning. Our younger students are getting at least 1- 15 minute session of recess daily plus their 45 minutes (PreK-30 min) of PE time in the afternoon. Library was never put on the art, music, and computer rotation this year because the committee thought that it would be confusing on when the kids to bring back their books because their library day would rotate to a different day of the week every week. (Our school is new to the idea of a specials rotation.) So this year, the teachers had to carve out time within their daily schedule for library once a week. It usually was only 15 minutes and the librarian/library clerk were never able to do lessons with them about tools you could use in the library etc. So...the proposal for next year is that when I have an entire PE class with 3 teachers like I usually do, that on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, one of those classrooms will not come to PE and will instead go to library. Also, there are parents from all over the district that are going to the higher ups advocating for recess so my principal wants to cut down daily intervention from 45 to 30 minutes and that 15 minutes will then go to recess on a daily basis for every grade. We are all passionate about what we do as educators. If we weren't, we would have no reason to do our jobs. I want to see my students every day. My students want to see me every day. But there are some issues I have with this proposition for next year. 1. So yes, there may be 75 minutes of recess scheduled a week, but how much of that will actually be for recess? If it's wet or cold, I assume they won't go out for recess. And if a class has a recess time and it is in the middle of a PE class they wouldn't be able to use my gym on bad weather days. I have seen recess used for many things other than recess. A consequence for poor behavior, kids sitting out finishing work, etc. 2. Many kids are already pulled from PE already on a weekly basis. If they go to speech or go to occupational therapy, they are pulled from PE. The counselor will pull kids from PE for counseling sessions. The kindergarten students who are struggling are being pulled from PE during the week for extra help. If a kid was absent from school, guess what class they are pulled from to do their makeup work? I have never liked kids missing gym time for these things, but I know that sometimes, it is needed. For speech, OT, etc, those things are in IEP's and must be followed. A kid who has been sick and needs to catch up….doing that in PE time is the best because they won’t miss any regular class time and the teacher is available and on conference as their kids are at PE with me. It might be easier for a kid to miss a PE class once a week than be pulled from art or music that they don't go to as often, or during math, reading, etc which are tested subjects. My principal is advocating that if you do the math, by gaining the 75 minutes of recess but losing 45 minutes of PE one time a week that the kids will gain 30 minutes of total activity. Based on my previous points, I don’t think this will work out how they actually think it will. So you could end up with kids who end up with zero physical activity on days they miss PE to go to library and the weather is bad. But even if I get my way and keep my PE schedule the way it is, where does library fit in the master schedule? I think the kids and teachers could adjust to adding library to A- Art, B- Music, C- Computer rotation. And on a week that where computer falls on 2 days, that is a flex period. Similar to what they already have. We don't have computer teachers anymore so teachers have to accompany the kids to the lab anyway. This would affect how often the music and art teachers would see their classes though. If they don’t want to add library into the specials rotation, why couldn’t we stagger when intervention was every day based on the grade and one day of the week, a class misses one intervention period and to go to the library? Right now our current intervention is school wide from 8-845AM. They want to do 90 minute blocks with their major subjects. Of course I have never done master scheduling before though so it can be super easy to have ideas, but actually making it come to life isn’t so easy. Is there an app for that?!? Thoughts? Aims. (The PE teacher who really likes her job )
Our kids go to gym everyday for 30 minutes. Then they rotate music and library. for 30 minutes a day.
I've worked on a master schedule committee before. The principal made guidelines or rules to play by from the beginning. She stated that we all came to the table with different pros and cons before we even started. Each one of us look at a situation from a different perspective. We all can't have our #1 want. She had us look at what we absolutely couldn't live without, what we could give up, and what we could negotiate. Then she presented those same things from her own stand point (or in other words, what the district was expecting from her). I think the important thing to remember here is that there are some things that you see as absolute that may be negotiable in another persons eyes. What's important is to step outside of your role as a PE teacher and look for what's going to work best for the whole school. I do agree with a lot of what you said. Those are facts. But, just remember that your administrator is looking at the situation from a different perspective that is probably driven by requirements from those higher up than him/or her.
Nonsense and I'll leave it at that. I'm in Texas too and I don't know if it's my district or my school specifically (though I've glanced at some other elems in the district and see similarities but not on my campus level crazy) but the specials schedule is so jacked it's ridiculous. It's so complicated it's ridiculous how crazy it is. My district last year was cut and dry easy.
From what I've heard every school in my district does it differently, but at the two I've been to enrichment(specials) is on a 3 day rotation with computer lab every day. So a class would have: Art, PE, LIB rinse repeat all year. Classes are 45 minutes. Computer Lab is 30. I'm at a Title 1 School and they fund our lab and the lab attendant so that is partially why it's on it's own schedule. We also have a second teacher only attended lab so that we can accommodate everyone. As for music, last year the district told every school you can't have art AND music. Pick one or the other unless you can pay for it yourself. I only know of ONE elementary that has both.
100 hours of PE per week, we go at my discretion. No set time or days, just when it fits in well to the day and it meets the 100 hours. My class has access to the library 5 days a week for 30 minutes during their independent reading time. Art is on Fridays and is student led/taught.
LOL, it is all about classroom management, you guys wasting time with management plans. My plan, 100 hours of PE per week, classroom disruptions by tuesday ZERO!!!!! It is minutes not hours.
I haven't the foggiest idea what my state's PE requirement, if any, is. This year, we rotate daily between Computers, Art, P.E., and Music. Library is its own thing, scheduled for one time a week between the teacher and the librarian at the beginning of the year. I'm a believer in recess--I think the kids deserve it and I deserve it. I rarely take it away. I can count on one hand the time I've taken it away as a consequence for misbehavior, and only then because the situation required it by school discipline policy. In other words, it was out of my hands and the AP watched the misbehaving kids. I have fewer qualms about having kids finish work before heading out to recess when I gave plenty of time to complete the work in question. If the majority of the class hasn't finished the work, we finish as a class later. If a couple of kids were goofing around instead of working, they may have to finish the work before recess. In such regards, I figure even missing all of recess isn't a problem and warrants no complaint if the kids are active outside of school. As for bad weather and recess, I could easily go into a "back in my day..." speech (about the 90s, of all times). For PE, it is one of our specials and we are told to avoid pulling kids during specials if at all possible. I agree with this. As you said, we are all professionals whether you're teaching advanced math or PE. The specials teachers are teaching legitimate and necessary classes, not just babysitting my kids while I plan.
I agree with this also. My last school took this very seriously. Students could not miss specials either as a consequence or to make-up work. Teachers at my new school though treat specials teachers like babysitters... They call them "prep teachers" and say the students are a "prep" when the students are at their specials classes, and they take them to specials class late when they want to use the time to do something in their own class. The principal requires the specials teachers to act as aides in the Pre-K classes or for sped students as part of their regular schedule. I would be so angry if I was in that position. The specials teachers are professionals too, and the students have every right to attend their specials classes as much as any other class.
Oh, I wish our kids could have Phys Ed every day--they have 2-40 minute periods a week. Our grade 6-8 classes have the gym to themselves when they are there; the younger kids are doubled up--2 classes and 2 teachers. They do have 60 minutes of recess daily (along with 10 minutes to eat snack and 20 minutes to eat lunch). Most grades have 2 periods of Music each week as well. Library is scheduled by the teacher and the librarian; we work together to plan what the kids will do in the library. It is exceptionally rare for kids to be pulled from Phys Ed, Music, Library or the Arts--it would only be done as a "one-off".
