In this episode, we’re joined by NCHPAD Program Manager Penny Edwards to discuss why weaving movement and wellness into the school day is so important for kids. With a background as an Exercise Physiologist, Penny now leads efforts to ensure NCHPAD leverages its strengths, expertise, and partnerships to deliver programs, resources, trainings, and community partnerships nationwide.

To find more content like this related to daily activities or health routines for kids at school or at home, visit our Mission:ME page.

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Episode Transcript

Quick Navigation (click the linked text below to jump to a new section)

• Intro
• Penny’s personal and professional background
• How wellness supports academic learning instead of distracting from it
• Small shifts in physical activity or movement that can completely change the tone of a classroom day
• How educators can incorporate movement breaks in a way that directly ties to academic learning
• Info about reset rituals and why these tools are so powerful for self-regulation
• Penny’s advice for starting small so wellness practices don’t feel like one more thing
• How Penny has seen schools positively impacted by adding more physical activity, adaptive exercises, and wellness routines for students
• Sensory-friendly movement options are for students who may feel overwhelmed by high-energy activities
• Do wellness and movement exercises have to be done exclusively in gyms or outdoors?
• How teachers can find resources for new wellness exercises for students
• Penny’s final thoughts

*Edited for clarity*

Host: 00:00

This is Wellness, Health and Everything Else: a NCHPAD Podcast.

Welcome to Wellness, Health and Everything Else: a NCHPAD Podcast. NCHPAD is the National Center on Health, Physical Activity and Disability – the nation’s premier center dedicated to promoting the health and wellness of everyone. In each episode, we explore topics at the intersection of health, wellness and mobility limitations. If you have an idea for a topic, would like to learn more about a topic or are interested in our free resources, programs and partnership opportunities, email us at nchpad@uab.edu, give us a call at 866-866-8896 or check out our website at nchpad.org.

Music Interlude

In this episode, we talk with NCHPAD Program Manager Penny Edwards about the importance of incorporating movement and wellness activities into the school day for kids.

Penny started her career as an Exercise Physiologist, and in her current role, she works to make sure NCHPAD is utilizing its strengths, partners and expertise to provide programs, resources, trainings and partnerships within communities across the country. Here is Penny diving deeper into her personal and professional background.

Penny Edwards: 01:20

I have three siblings. I’m one of four children. I have two brothers and a twin sister. My twin sister and I do not look alike. I have black hair. She has red hair. I am the daughter of a current U.S. veteran. He spent 24 years in the Air Force, so I moved around a lot. My mother studied education in school, but she stayed with us when we were younger, and then when we were older, she became the bookkeeper for the commissary on base, which is the grocery store. Mom’s always been good at numbers. I’m not. I was a two-sport athlete in college. I played volleyball and softball. I was an All-American and academic All-American athlete, but education always came first. It was very important to me. I have a bachelor’s and master’s degree in exercise science, and I have lived my life through athletics and serving others. Professional background, I started my career as an exercise physiologist in cardiac rehab in Montgomery, Alabama, at Montgomery Cardiovascular Associates. Then I spent a few years as the intramurals coordinator, teaching some courses at Auburn University of Montgomery. I spent a bulk of my career, 11 years, as a senior program manager for the Healthy Schools and Communities program with the Alliance for a Healthier Generation. When I left that job, I became an expert inclusion specialist at Lakeshore with the National Center on Health, Physical Activity, and Disability, and now I am part of the research collaborative with UAB as the Strategy 3 program manager, where I get to manage our community engagement work.

Host: 02:48

Many educators worry that adding more time for physical activity can take away from instructional time. Here are Penny’s thoughts about how wellness supports academic learning instead of distracting from it.

Penny Edwards: 02:57

That’s actually a great question. And I think the one thing that people need to recognize is that research actually shows that children who are more active tend to do better in the classroom. So academic learning improves the student’s cognitive functions, it reduces stress, it enhances focus, and it increases the blood flow. So I think what a lot of people forget is that the longer a child sits, or even an adult sits, the blood’s not flowing as much. So getting kids up and moving, or even just sitting in their chair going back and forth, can actually increase the blood flow, which then enhances concentration and memory. It also improves a child’s mood and behavior, so you have less behavior problems and you’re able to stay on focus a little bit more. And it actually creates a more conducive learning environment for every child. And of course, like I mentioned earlier, research is showing that students who engage in regular physical activity tend to perform better in the classroom, and they have better academic outcomes.

Host: 03:56

Penny discussed some small shifts in physical activity or movement that can completely change the tone of a classroom day.

Penny Edwards: 04:03

There are a lot of things a teacher can do. They can incorporate short stretch breaks. They can have children sit in their desks and roll their shoulders, do some exercises sitting down, if they’re concerned that getting up might cause a little bit of a distraction. But they can also integrate movement into their lessons. So if you’re teaching history, have the students maybe act something out, positively change the atmosphere. Instead of sitting there and counting, the kids can say, “Okay, five times five, how many is that? Do that many jumping jacks.” So, again, that’ll boost the energy levels that’ll re-engage students. A couple of years ago, there was this huge focus on kinesthetic learning, which is really just integrating movement and hands-on activities into your everyday classroom, which is the easiest thing most people can do, but also just letting the kids stretch, think about it, and have them move every 60 minutes. But I mean, keeping in mind that most of the time, people, like back in the early 2000s, would say, “Well, we’re going to take brain breaks.” But researchers have said the brain never really takes a break. So what you’re doing is you’re taking time to re-engage and to get that blood flowing, like I mentioned earlier. So even if you have the kids do an exercise from their desk or stand up, stretch, whatever, every 60 minutes, you’re still going to be on task more than trying to re-engage their behavior after sitting for multiple hours.

Host: 05:29

Here’s how educators can incorporate movement breaks in a way that directly ties to academic learning.

Penny Edwards: 05:35

Like I mentioned earlier, let’s not think about it as a break, but more of an engagement in the blood flowing, helping the brain, and the brain being more engaged. There’s a guy named John Ratey who wrote a book, Spark, and he talks about how movement is like fertilizer for the brain. And so I think when you think about what you’re doing during your day, think about what you’re teaching. How can you incorporate maybe hands-on activities? How can you, like I said, with a math lesson and counting, change the atmosphere of your classroom so that you’re naturally integrating movement into the classroom instead of thinking about this being just one more thing? So if I’m teaching a lesson on science, is there something I can have the kids put together and learn that way, like hands-on, let’s talk about it. So like there’s natural movement, but learning at the same time. But like I said, all of the research shows that a child who’s more active does better in the classroom. And for females, kids who are more active tend to have higher math and science scores, which is huge because females tend to have lower scores in those areas. So, movement of any kind, children should be active. We’re not designed as humans to sit down all the time. So, the more we sit down, the more we’re becoming disengaged. We’re looking all over the place and losing focus. So the more we add just a little bit of movement, allowing kids to move a little bit or stretch a little bit and not get in trouble for wiggling in their seats, they’re going to be more engaged in the class, which means that their learning outcomes will be higher because their targets will be hit instead of trying to re-engage a class that has lost focus.

Host: 07:11

We asked about reset rituals and why these tools are so powerful for self-regulation.

Penny Edwards: 07:15

One of the things schools have done, as far as allowing kids to reset themselves, is they started these things called sensory classrooms. So if a child needs a little bit of time to reset, maybe their emotions aren’t where they need to be, they can go in the sensory room. And a lot of times they have some exercise equipment, a little bit of sensory-type stuff, and so I think it’s the same way when you’re talking about a lesson. I was never good at math, so I would often find myself doing breathing techniques and math to calm myself down, because I would second-guess myself. So, I think a lot of times when you think about where your class is at, allowing kids to breathe, take a little bit of a reset, it reduces anxiety a little bit. And what we have found coming out of COVID is that children tend to have more anxiety than kids did 10, 15, 20 years ago in school. So I think just allowing a child to take deep breaths —or the class to take deep breaths, and even the teacher — it allows for things to be reset. Maybe the lesson wasn’t going the way the teacher had hoped. Maybe the kids were struggling a little bit. Maybe it was a hard day. Because we don’t know what the kids are facing when they come in. So just allowing them to breathe sets everybody back on the same path, and it allows the class to say, “Okay, we’re going to take some breathing, we’re going to refocus and this is where we’re going to start.” And then everybody’s on the same playing field.  They’ve all had a chance to let that energy go.

Host: 08:45

Many teachers already feel stretched thin in their daily role. Here’s Penny’s advice for starting small so wellness practices don’t feel like one more thing.

Penny Edwards: 08:54

Teachers have a lot on their plates, and they have a lot of deliverables that they have to meet. They have a lot of things like reading scores, test scores and data that’s thrown at them every day. So the one thing I start with is reminding the teachers that they also need time to reset. They need time throughout the day to refocus themselves, not get so caught up in what’s going to happen. Are my kids learning this? Are my kids retaining this? So you can even start with I’m going to do something three times a day for 60 seconds, for a minute. I’m going to have the kids breathe. I’m going to have them stretch. I’m going to find a way that makes sense. You can go even simpler than that. Like this week, instead of going straight to lunch at lunchtime, I’m gonna take my class out two minutes earlier, and we’re gonna walk a longer route to the lunchroom, and we’re gonna walk a longer route back.

With recess, some schools have recess, and some schools don’t. Across the country, not every child has recess every single day. So for those schools that don’t do something, kids are sitting six to seven hours a day. We’re housed in Alabama, where daily physical education is required K-8, but there are several states where it’s not, or they might only have physical education three days a week. So what I tell them is it seems like something so big, but as you build it in, you will you will see the transition in your class and you will have fewer behavior problems because research is showing that. So it might at first seem like something so big, but at the end of the day, it actually ends up improving and helping with your workload.

Host: 10:33

Here’s how Penny has seen schools positively impacted by adding more physical activity, adaptive exercises, and wellness routines for students.

Penny Edwards: 10:40

I think a lot of schools have started incorporating running clubs before school, maybe some sports clubs after school, engaging in brain boosters throughout the day, and quality physical education programs. I think a lot of the schools that have done this, I’ve seen a huge transformation in behavior. Children are learning better. They’re willing to try new things. There’s less anxiety. I know that there’s one school where they talk about this one child who would get in trouble like three or four times a day, but he wanted to play in the after-school elementary sports program. And so his teacher said, “Okay, you can play, but you have to stay out of trouble.” His mom put him in the running club in the morning, he was in the sports program after school, and his behavior has transformed. That was five years ago. Since that day, the child has not been written up or had a late assignment. So, the opportunity to be part of a team and to do something, but also understanding that maybe he needed an outlet to be active, has changed his performance because they recognized that maybe he was getting a little antsy in the classroom. I think for a lot of schools, sometimes you have to figure out what’s right for you. And I think a lot of times schools focus on, let’s do this school-wide, which is often great when you have policies and things like that, because schools across the country have to have wellness policies, but at the end of the day, sometimes the teacher just has to do what makes sense for their classroom. So one teacher might be really good at integrating movement into the lesson, but for another teacher, it might just make more sense for her kids to get up and stretch. So I think a lot of times what I find in most districts and schools that are successful is when the teacher recognizes the needs of their individual students and [tailors instruction] based on their kids.

Host: 12:29

We asked what some sensory-friendly movement options are for students who may feel overwhelmed by high-energy activities.

Penny Edwards: 12:36

A lot of schools have sensory paths where children can go and do the sensory path. So I know a lot of schools, if they’re doing stretching activities or something like that, a teacher could just allow the kid to go do the sensory trails that are built into schools that are designed to address that. I also think when you’re doing an activity like in physical education, most physical education teachers have their main activity for the day, and then they have an alternate activity for students who may not like that activity, especially in middle and high school. So, I think if the teacher thinks about every child in their class and knows how the child is and how the child reacts, they can participate in some activities. The biggest thing to keep in mind for a lot of kids with sensory issues is the noise. So if you can reduce the noise or chaos through sensory paths outside or different types of activities. And even like some teachers will put Play-Doh on the desk. So kids can just play with Play-Doh, fidget spinners. Like some teachers will allow the fidget spinners in there. I think, again, that’s one of those things where it’s just going to come down to your classroom, your students and what makes sense for them.

Host: 13:49

We also wanted to know if wellness and movement exercises have to be done exclusively in gyms or outdoors.

Penny Edwards: 13:55

No, they don’t. They can be done in small spaces. So, there are a lot of resources out there that are designed for the classroom. There are brain booster activities. We actually have some on our YouTube website that are adapted for individuals with disabilities to participate in a brain booster. But no, they don’t have to be done in the gym. They don’t have to be done outdoors. Like a classroom teacher can do things simply. Like you can do exercises from your desk, you can do things in your classroom, or you can have sensory trails down the hallway. Wherever you have a little bit of space for a child to move, exercise can be done.

Host: 14:30

Here’s Penny discussing how teachers can find resources for new wellness exercises for students.

Penny Edwards: 14:35

So at nchpad.org, we actually have an entire toolkit based on wellness and wellness activities and things you can think of. But we also have some partners that have great resources. So we have HEAL United, which stands for Healthy Eating, Active Living. They have a lot of resources and tools, and a whole program designed for the physical education teacher and the classroom teacher to work together. There’s actually a program called Action-Based Learning that you can just Google and find their stuff online. Their entire curriculum is specific to the classroom and children moving kinesthetically. So blending the learning into movement. There’s a program called Aim for Pi. They’re also designed to integrate kinesthetic learning into the classroom. So again, mixing curriculum with activity. And there’s also GoNoodle. And then, like I mentioned earlier, I did work previously with the Alliance for a Healthier Generation and the Healthy Schools and Community Program. And they had to have an assessment where you can assess what your school is doing, and then how you can incorporate more. And then they’ll produce resources based on an action plan. So there are a lot of resources out there that could help somebody get started. And then you can also just check in your own community. Like, what are teachers already doing? What programs are already out there? Who can help? There are a lot of schools that are already doing things. And maybe you can just borrow an idea from another teacher.

Host: 16:00

Here are Penny’s final thoughts.

Penny Edwards: 16:02

So like I said earlier, if you’re thinking about doing this and you’re an administrator or like a teacher (and maybe the teacher has to get approval from the administrator), I’d look up the book called Spark from John Ratey. There are also some TEDx talks that talk about the movement and the science behind movement in the classroom and why it’s important. But at the end of the day, I think what people have to realize is the more you have your kids move, the more you’re moving. And the more that we move, the better that we feel. It helps all of us with our behavior. It helps our brain stay engaged. It reduces stress for all of us. And it’s a win-win for everybody. So when you think about wellness and movement, and why should I do this? I’m a little bit older, so when I went to school in the 90s, kinesthetic learning, hands-on learning, was a part of the classroom. Kids were not sitting for six to seven hours a day. And how we made that transition over the last 20 years, 25 years, to where kids are now sitting all day, is a transition that probably should have gone the other way. We should have been doing more hands-on learning, more kinesthetic learning. Children learn by absorbing. And so the way that a lot of classrooms are is you have three types of learners. You have visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. And the majority of children and adults will test into that kinesthetic range. But the majority of our education curricula are designed around auditory learners. So I think we have to really start thinking about who the other learners are and how we can help benefit them. And one of the ways that we can do that is by incorporating movement and hands-on learning into the classroom. It’s just a win-win for everybody.

Host: 17:43

Thanks for listening to Wellness, Health and Everything Else. For a full episode transcript, visit our website and find the episode in the podcasts and videos section. You can also find helpful links mentioned in the episode in the episode description on streaming platforms and the episode page on our website. If you have questions about NCHPAD’s free resources, programs and partnership opportunities, email us at nchpad@uab.edu, call us at 866-866-8896 or check out our website at nchpad.org.