School PE classes now using Wii?
Well, not quite. At least - not yet. What has happened is that four schools in the UK have now decided to embark on a lottery funded project to use the Wii as part of their offerings to students doing PE classes. The logic? Simply that certain students who would otherwise completely skip the PE class, are now likely to remain and participate. Team working skill increases have also been reported, as children play together in a fashion that is far more akin to the way they socialise today.
Heart rate monitors were purchased along with a Wii for each school using the scheme. The children invited to participate were those who had often missed PE lessons, aged 14-16.
As expected, there are already nay-sayers decrying the project as no replacement for real sports. Of course this is true, but we feel that any step towards breaking a sweat on children who otherwise would not participate at all is a good one - especially if team skill improvements are also noticed.
We've got one serious reservation, however. What kind of a message does this send to all the other unethusiastic but usually obedient students? Only a small percentage of school children strongly identify with PE as a favourite lesson, in fact it is one of the most loathed across the board. This suggests that students may notice the Wii alternative and decide that not going to a few PE lessons might be a good thing ... if it means indoor play on a Wii instead of a forced cross country ramble around the local area, or rugby on a freezing pitch.
Reinforcing bad behaviour is not the way to go, teachers. Get the Wii into the PE course and give all students access to it! If some students play truant from other forms of PE, giving them endless Wii gaming isn't going to send a very good message to the other students who're bothering to try.
The Wii should be for all, or not at all.
I would much rather have played on the Wii when I was at school than gone ou and been forced to run for miles, which often made me feel very ill anyway.