Physical education also known as P.E, is considered to be one the most crucial subjects at school. However, a part of the general public tends to underestimate the importance of outdoor activities at school. In this article, we aim to show our point of view and raise awareness to society about physical education. Why should I care about P.E, and how can P.E improve my life? These are questions we aim to answer.
There are a number of advantages of physical education. First of all, students can derive benefits regarding their health from P.E. To be more specific, regular exercises can stave off the risk of some common diseases, such as obesity or diabetes since a lot of children, tend to have a sedentary lifestyle and have less enthusiasm for outdoor activities. For instance, exercise help accelerate the heart rate as well as the amount of oxygen flowing into your lungs which result in generating more energy instead of lactic acid (a component tiring your muscles) (Mercola.com, 2019). Throughout our research we found out that P.E can play a pivotal role in the well-being of students. It can help them interfere and reduce with health problems.
Physical education can be highly beneficial to relief academic stress. According to Fitness Park (a reliable internet source), in which a study was done, showed that physical education rises the blood pressure significantly allowing the brain to solve these problems instantly. Moreover, some neurotransmitters, such as endorphins, serotonin, dopamine, glutamate, and GABA (acid gamma-aminobutyric) also played a vital role in controlling emotions (Mercola.com, 2019) which leads to the solution for diminishing the level of mental discomfort. Therefore, P.E has emerged to increase children’s stamina, and help them to resist and reduce stress levels. Showing, P.E is necessary and advantageous for students.
Despite of all the aforementioned benefits, there are still people who are skeptical and refuse to spend time exercising. One major reason is, that in this complex world, people tend to consume more time on studying than looking after their own health, being it physically or mentally, (Management, Loss and Loss, 2019) which leads to laziness and the reduction of strength. For example, if you study 10 hours per day and 5 days a week, you would be exhausted, spending all your weekend sleeping.
Another reason for lack of exercise, is being unmotivated. (Management, Loss and Loss, 2019). Physical exercise is hard, taking a lot of effort and being very time consuming. Therefore, showing that convenience is more important than ensuring good metal and physical heath. This also holds true in Vietnamese culture where people and students specifically choose to focus on academics rather than health. Therefore, if you have no reason to do it, or have no information on how it benefits you, then why would you spend time on physical activities?
For the purpose of our outcome we also chose to conduct our own field research in Denmark in order to achieve more practical results, and international collaboration. Our data has been accumulated by about 10 students from Denmark, with most of these interviewees being in high school. Our data shows most of the participants being male with a ratio of 60:40. Approximately 83.3% of Denmark students spend once a week on P.E, with 71.4% of those pupils consider P.E as a crucial activity at school. However, only 57% think that they are given enough time for their physical activities, while almost 30% demand more time with P.E. This shows that student highly regard P.E as a vital subject, and they have been nurtured the belief that P.E is indispensable to Danish students. Besides, only 10% of them said that physical education doesn’t give them any benefits. On the other hand, 90% of them are conscious that physical education gives them advantages on relax and health promotion.
On the contrary research from Vietnamese students, produce very similar results, but with one major difference. Vietnamese students don’t feel they have enough time to do P.E. Judging from our experience as Vietnamese students we notice that though P.E is bringing lots of benefits it is being underestimated and schools are not paying enough attention and importance for it.
Mercola.com. (2019). What Happens in Your Body When You Exercise?. [online] Available at: https://fitness.mercola.com/sites/fitness/archive/2013/09/20/exercise-health-benefits.aspx [Accessed 29 Jan. 2019].
Management, W., Loss, W. and Loss, E. (2019). Ten Reasons People Do Not Exercise | Livestrong.com.[online]LIVESTRONG.COM. Available at:
https://www.livestrong.com/article/370670-ten-reasons-people-do-not-exercise/ [Accessed 29 Jan. 2019].
• Tran Hai Minh, Nguyen Huy Minh, Chu Tran Quoc Bao, Thai Ba Hien, Nguyen Khanh (11IG2E0)
.jpg)
