Pleasantly surprised about total recess time

[Nart]

My son goes to half day PS kinder. I was looking at the bell schedule for his school for first grade and realized that next year he will have a 20 minute recess in the morning, 55 minutes for lunch, and 15 minutes for afternoon recess. I am excited for him that he will be outside for an hour and a half. I am not sure if this schedule includes physical education too, which is 100 minutes a week by California law. Or if that means he will have another 20 minutes outside. I was worried his school would be too concerned about test scores (it is the highest performing shool in the district) to let them play so long.

 

How much recess time do your kids get?

[SKL]

I don't know the minutes, but they (1st grade) report that they usually go outside twice per day. They also have gym class twice a week, I believe. Our lunches are not outdoors; we live in the upper Midwest, so that would not make for a comfy lunch hour.

 

I agree that more is better when it comes to physical activity for young kids. I'm glad some of the better performing schools have enough sense to realize that.

[Julie Smith]

But is that 55 minutes for lunch, as in eating lunch. Or 55 minutes to play outside after eating lunch?

[Arcadia]

For our neighborhood school, kindergarten is 8:15am to 2:15pm with a 15 min morning recess and a 20 min lunch break. There is no afternoon recess so older was always starving when I picked him up. The lunch break includes both eating and playing. They have PE once a week for kindergarten and 1st.

[Uff Da!]

I don't know! :blushing: It's great your kid has a lot of recess.

[Nart]

But is that 55 minutes for lunch, as in eating lunch. Or 55 minutes to play outside after eating lunch?

 

It is 55 minutes for eating and playing, but since we live in California lunch is eaten outdoors unless it rains. I am a huge proponent of the importance of kids getting enough natural light and outdoor time, so I am happy that he will be outside.

[mom2lydia]

My daughter is 2nd grade and they get 15 min in the morning and 15 min in the afternoon and that is time from lineing up to entering back into the class. They do get 40 min for lunch, in the cafeteria as in the midwest outside lunch would be pretty miserable. Recess also isn't always outside it depends on the weather. If it's raining or snowing it's inside and if the windchill/temperature is below 32 it's inside. So pretty much most the winter, half the spring and some of the fall are inside.

[Dmmetler]

One reason why I put my DD in the parochial school instead of the public one was because of 30 minute 2x/day recesses-through 8th grade. If weather is bad, recess takes half the gym if PE is in session, or the whole gym if it's not (it's a small school, so only one class is in PE at a time, and maybe 2 might be at recess at a given time, which makes that doable). The public schools here only get about 15 minutes or so at a time, and it does seem like most of the time is spent walking out and lining up (We're right across the street from the PS playground, so I can observe quite easily), and there's not enough equipment for the kids they have (DD's former school had three playgrounds, plus multiple fields/basketball courts, and so on-so you could have kindergarten on one playground, 3rd on another, and 8th on the basketball court without the kids running over each other).

 

I pulled her for various reasons, but recess wasn't one of them!

[kiwik]

Here school is 9 to 3. Morning break is 10.30 to 10.50 and lunch is from 12.30 to 1.30. The first 20 or so minutes the children are required to sit and eat (outside unless poor weather in which case they eat in their classrooms). There are slight variations between schools but this is fairly standard.

 

Once they reach high school the days are slightly longer.

[Charlened1974]

Oh my word. I can't imagine. I teach a full day kindergarten in TN. We have 25 minutes for lunch, which is actually only fifteen minutes by the time they are all through the line. Recess is 25 minutes. I put as much activity in the day as possible, but for the kids to be able to eat instead of gulping their food? How lovely that would be...

[cathmom]

My children do have a daily recess, but the day they have PE, they don't get recess, and if it is less than 40 degrees, they don't get recess, so there are days where there is no recess.

[Lena1967]

That does sound good. In our public school, there is one 30-minute recess, which is right after lunch. I do credit our principal for having the kids go outside as much as possible -- apparently, other principals in our area tend to keep the kids in for the slightest bit of unpleasant weather. There is also a 45-minute PE class once a week which is separate from recess, but to my knowledge it is never outside.

[kiwik]

Oh I forgot swimming four times a week in summer and/or PE are on top of the scheduled breaks. Because our teachers teach everything they often take the little kids outside to play a quick game of tag if they think they need it. They also do outdoor maths games etc when the weather is good too. And a lot of schools have vegetable gardens so that is more outside stuff. In New Zealand though we do have a very temperate climate and the area I am in has particularly good weather most of the year.

 

I can't imagine having young kids inside all day with such short breaks.