Testing Body Composition in School

  • At the end of this school year, the Presidential Fitness Test will no longer be available in schools. Most schools will be transitioning to the Presidential Youth Fitness Program. This program does include assessments.

    It will assess the following:
    Aerobic Capacity
    • Mile run
    • PACER
    • Walk Test
    Muscular Strength/Endurance
    • Push-ups
    • Curl-ups
    • Trunk lift
    • Flexed Arm Hang
    • Modified Pull-up
    Flexibility
    • Back-Saver Sit and Reach
    • Shoulder Stretch
    Body Composition
    • Body Mass Index
    • Percentage Body Fat


    Looks pretty similar to me. However- how do you feel about the addition of body composition?
  • My son's school does height and weight and calculates BMI. They've never done body composition testing and I would be surprised if they started now. I think it's unlikely to be done accurately and I also think it's more invasive (too much hands on contact) than most schools are willing to get. And I am guessing most schools will do the same - just looking at the FAQs

    http://fitnessgram.net/faqparents/

    Quote:
    Body composition testing (like any fitness assessment) is a personal matter. Because body composition is a particularly sensitive issue, additional care should be taken to ensure that it is conducted in a setting in which the child feels safe and the results can be kept confidential.
    So you are talking about at least 2 adults involved in the process, because they aren't going to have the gym teacher by him or herself take a child somewhere "confidential" and then get handsy with them to conduct a skin fold test. And if this is done during gym class time, you'd need a 3rd adult to actually conduct the class for the rest of the kids!

    Very unlikely to happen IMO, and I expect most schools will default to using BMI only.
  • There are many different ways of measuring the amount of body fat or body composition, which vary in accuracy, ease of measurement, costs and equipment requirements.



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    Aries86
  • I remember having my body fat measured with calipers when I was in grade school :/. I used to fail all of these hardcore. I wonder how I'd do now lol.
  • When I was a kid I hated these tests. Looking back I don't think they were effective because my results were always pretty bad. I walked the mile, I couldn't do push ups or pull ups. Ok no big deal at the time but now I remember that my phys ed teachers were morons. They took absolutely no interest in me. Those teachers never cared about all the kids in the class, they only paid attention to the athletic kids, encouraging them, recruiting them for the various sports teams they coached.

    More assessments more assessments, as a teacher myself I'm sick of the assessments. What we need in phys ed is better teachers, teachers who will take the time to encourage the kids who are too scared to run, too scared to try. At the time I blew it off like "oh I don't feeeeeeel like running" but the truth was I couldn't run or I was too scared of huffing and puffing around other kids.
  • Pointless, useless, waste of time, invasion of privacy.
  • Quote: When I was a kid I hated these tests. Looking back I don't think they were effective because my results were always pretty bad. I walked the mile, I couldn't do push ups or pull ups. Ok no big deal at the time but now I remember that my phys ed teachers were morons. They took absolutely no interest in me. Those teachers never cared about all the kids in the class, they only paid attention to the athletic kids, encouraging them, recruiting them for the various sports teams they coached.

    More assessments more assessments, as a teacher myself I'm sick of the assessments. What we need in phys ed is better teachers, teachers who will take the time to encourage the kids who are too scared to run, too scared to try. At the time I blew it off like "oh I don't feeeeeeel like running" but the truth was I couldn't run or I was too scared of huffing and puffing around other kids.
    This right here. I always half-assed these kinds of assessments for fear of being made fun of by the other kids for not being good at it. I was already berated just for being overweight; I didn't need it to be made worse by fitting the stereotype. And the teachers couldn't have cared less. I had kids throw soccer balls at me during gym class and the teachers did absolutely nothing. It still amazes me to this day.
  • I had a coach in college test my body fat and announce in front of an entire line of girls that, "I'm just going to write here 'TOO FAT'" as he wrote my body fat percentage down on a card. Talk about humiliating!