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American Fitness 09-01-2003
 * Strength training guidelines for children ; Ashmore, Amy

Strength training guidelines for children

Byline: Ashmore, Amy Volume: 21 Number: 5 ISSN: 08935238 Publication Date: 09-01-2003 Page: 62 Section: CEU Type: Periodical Language: English

IMAGE PHOTOGRAPH Both the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recommend strength training for children as young as six years old. In general, if a child is old enough to participate in organized sports, he or she is ready for a strength training program. Contrary to a popular misconception, there is no evidence that an age-appropriate strength training program, done under qualified supervision, is detrimental to a child. In fact, research has shown strength training helps children maintain a healthy body weight, benefits skeletal and joint development as well as improves sports performance. ACSM reported that strength training programs can prevent as many as 50 percent of all preadolescent sports injuries. Furthermore, Dr. Avery Faigenbaum, a leading research scientist in the children and strength training field, recently reported that for over 17 years he and colleagues conducted strength training classes for children, ages six to 12, without a single injury.

Among the general developmental benefits of strength training is its ability to increase bone mineral density, thereby decreasing the risk of developing osteoporosis later in life. In 1994, Welton and colleagues showed the skeleton is most responsive to strength training benefits during growth. This means strength training is most beneficial for young women before the age of 16 and young men before the age of 18. Evidently, the benefits acquired are long term. Post-menopausal women suffered fewer hip fractures if they had engaged in weight-bearing activity as young girls.

In addition to decreasing the risk of osteoporosis, strength training:


 * strengthens ligaments and tendons


 * readies soft tissues to produce the forces associated with play, making them more pliable and resistant to external forces

IMAGE TABLE Recommended Dumbbell Exercises for Children
 * improves motor fitness skills, such as jumping and sprinting, which are often required in sports performance.

As with any physical activity, certain precautions should be taken for the participant's safety. Adult strength training guidelines and programs should not be applied to children. Therefore, a child should not do spine-loading exercises (e.g., a squat under a bar) or engage in bodybuilding due to its risks to the growth plates and spine. Under no circumstances should a child who has not reached skeletal maturity (i.e., Tanner stage 5; typically at age 15 for girls and age 17 for boys) perform a maximum weight lift or any ballistic movements seen in Olympic weightlifting and power lifting. Every trainer must remember that special care must be taken when placing loads and demands on a developing muscular skeletal system. To aid practitioners who work with children in strength training settings, ACSM and AAP offer basic guidelines.

Guidelines for a Children's Strength Training Program


 * The program should include at least one exercise for all major muscle groups.


 * Children should learn movements without weight first.


 * The program should be done on non-consecutive days.


 * The child should perform one to three sets of each exercise. Each set should include six to 15 repetitions.


 * Set weights for individual participants within developmentally appropriate boundaries.


 * Once a child has mastered an exercise with weight, additional weight can be added in 5 percent increments (typically one to five pounds) every seven to 10 days.

Since children are nor small adults, they should nor do exercises on adult-sized machines. Although youth-sized equipment is available, few gyms offer these machines. Therefore, as a general rule, trainers should use dumbbell exercises for children. The addirional advantage of dumbbell exercises is that they can be done in limited space. Following are recommended dumbbell exercises, along with the major muscle groups worked.

Most children do not have strength training experience and will need to be taught basic exercises. When instructing, keep in mind that children learn through repetition. Therefore, choose the exercises you want the child to learn and have him or her repeat them during each session until he or she has mastered them. This may take one or several weeks. Focus on form and technique and give the child feedback on how he or she did the exercise at the end of each repetition. Also, correct one problem at a time, think safety first and always say something positive before anything critical.

Trainer's Tips


 * Pay close attention to form.


 * Be patient. Do not expect children to learn exercises quickly.


 * Use a four-count system, two counts for the up phase and two counts for the down phase, to keep a movement slow and controlled.


 * Teach the child what muscle is working by using touch-place your hand on the child's muscle and tell him or her to squeeze where your hand is.

Because strength training is structured similar to play (i.e., periods of high-energy activity alternated with longer periods of rest), it can be fun for children. A trainer can build upon this by incorporating a few ideas that appeal to them. First, children like to know what they have accomplished. Chart the child's progress using such variables as a skill learned, weight lifted or number of repetitions. Second, have the child keep an exercise journal. Ask him or her to write his or her least and most favorite exercises or anything else he or she wants to share. Lastly, keep in mind that children like variation and to have a say in what they do. Ask the child to decide what exercise he or she wants to perform next or, when appropriate, if he or she would like to try a variation of an exercise. The key is to make the child's strength training time fun. Each child is an individual and you, as the trainer, will have to decide what works for each.

When done under proper, qualified supervision, strength training can be both beneficial and fun for children. Children today are inactive and need to get moving. Strength training is a fun way to build skeletal and muscle strength as well as improve self-esteem and confidence. Get children involved in strength training today and on the right track to a healthy, active lifestyle. AF IMAGE PHOTOGRAPHREFERENCE References

American Academy of Pediatrics. Committee on Sports Medicine. Strength Training by Children and Adolescents. June 2001.

American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM). Current Comment 'Youth Strength Training.' March 1998.

American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM). "The prevention of sports injuries of children and adolescents." Medicine &amp; Science in Sports &amp; Exercise, 1993. 25 (8, Supplement), 1-7.

Welton, D.C., Kemper, H.C., Post, G.B., et al. "Weight-bearing activity during youth is a more important factor for peak bone mass than calcium intake." Journal of Bone Mineral Research, 1994. 9(7), 1089-96. AUTHOR_AFFILIATION By Amy Ashmore, Ph.D. AUTHOR_AFFILIATION Amy Ashmore, Ph.D., earned a doctorate in kinesiology from the University of Texas at Austin. She can be reached at amyashmorephd@aol.com.

Copyright Aerobics and Fitness Association of America Sep/Oct 2003 || Ashmore, Amy. "Strength training guidelines for children." __American Fitness__. 01 Sep 2003. 62. __eLibrary__. Proquest CSA. GETTYSBURG AREA HIGH SCHOOL. 12 Nov 2008. .

In Some PE Classes, Counting Small Steps To Achieve Fitness ; Valerie Strauss Washington Post Staff Writer The Washington Post 05-21-2008

In Some PE Classes, Counting Small Steps To Achieve Fitness Byline: Valerie Strauss Washington Post Staff Writer Edition: FINAL Section: Metro

Thirty students file into the gym of Montgomery County's largest elementary school. Each grabs a pedometer, and, to the strains of "Cotton-Eye Joe," starts to jump and stretch, twist and balance, roll and crab walk.

For almost an hour, teacher Cindy Lins keeps them moving. Then the pedometers are checked, and the energy output assessed. Fourteen students have gone as far as a half-mile. Many are breathing harder than when they came in, rating a "moderate."

The fitness class at Spark M. Matsunaga Elementary School in Germantown is an innovation, although it might not look like it.

As schools are thwarted by mandates and lack of money in their efforts to offer more physical education, they are trying to offer better physical education. At Matsunaga, the focus is on fitness, not competitive sports. Students are taught that aerobic activity helps physically and mentally. "It helps get rid of our excess energy and makes it easier to focus in class," said Jonathon Bateky, 11.

The class takes place once a week, and health experts say that explains a key problem with school physical education programs -- not enough time is spent in them to do any real good.

"To truly have an impact in skill development, you need a minimum of three times a week," Lins said.

The most important strategy for combating obesity is increasing physical activity, according to a Government Accountability Office report. And health experts say it's time for schools to play a bigger role.

About 4 percent of elementary schools, 8 percent of middle schools and 2 percent of high schools provide daily physical education, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Twenty-two percent do not require students to take any phys-ed class.

The National Association for Sport and Physical Education recommends that schools provide at least 150 minutes of exercise per five-day school week at the elementary school level and 225 minutes a week for middle and high school students. The reality: Public elementary schools nationwide offer 85 minutes a week for first-graders and 98 minutes a week for sixth-graders, according to a 2005 report by the National Center for Education Statistics.

A few lawmakers want physical education requirements mandated under No Child Left Behind, the very law some educators blame for cutbacks in structured gym classes. As schools increased instructional time for core classes, the role of physical education diminished.

But the reauthorization of the No Child law appears stalled. In Maryland, a bill has been introduced mandating 90 minutes of physical education and 60 minutes of other physical activity each week in pre-kindergarten through fifth grade. Virginia's legislature approved a bill recommending the same.

"Forty minutes a day, five days a week can make a big difference in the health of children," said Daniel W. Jones, president of the American Heart Association. "That can be accomplished in the school setting."

Legislating exercise has not been easy, however. In Maryland, such bills have been defeated in each of the past four years in large part because state education officials object to mandated time in any subject. The recommendation that Virginia's legislature just passed started out as a mandate for physical education but was changed. No one wants to be accused of micromanaging the school day. And there is still no physical education requirement in the pending reauthorization of the No Child law.

Some school systems, hampered in their efforts to increase the quantity of phys-ed classes, have turned to improving quality.

The focus on competitive sports "left out a lot of kids, who stood on the sidelines and watched," said Terri McCauley, supervisor of health and physical education for Montgomery County Public Schools.

The situation began to change in the 1990s with the standards movement in education, which allows school systems to set content and performance standards for teachers to meet, and new revelations about the effect of exercise on the body and brain. Some educators decided that it was time to change the focus of physical education to health and to ensure that teachers were properly trained.

"It is very important that people not think that we can substitute physical activity for physical education," said McCauley, adding that there is a difference between recess and carefully designed exercise. "They are not the same things," she said.

Today there are programs built around standards set by states and school systems. In Maryland, six physical education standards were approved in 2006: exercise physiology, biomechanics, social-psychological principles, motor learning, physical activity and skillfulness.

So instead of awkwardly waiting to be picked -- or not -- for a team, students at Matsunaga are guided by individualized programs and goals. Instead of climbing a rope while the whole class watches, they are graded privately.

Students are taught health-related fitness skills so they understand the importance of cardiovascular fitness, flexibility, muscular endurance, strength and body composition, McCauley said. The elementary school focus is on developmental stages and movement; in middle school, on tactical games, problem-solving and decision-making; in high school, on the principles of physical education.

The most advanced school programs, such as PE4Life in Naperville, Ill., promote daily physical education.

Students who voluntarily exercised before a literacy class improved reading and comprehension scores by 1.4 years on a grade-level equivalence test, Pe4Life President Anne Flannery said. And at an elementary school in Kansas City, Mo., where PE4Life is based, disciplinary incidents dropped 67 percent, Flannery said.

There are no PE4Life programs in the Washington area, but McCauley is in her third year of a $1.1 million Physical Education Program grant, which the company helped persuade Congress to establish in December 2000 to start or improve programs geared toward fitness.

McCauley used her grant to buy FITNESSGRAM, a software that allows teachers to assess and keep track of key fitness markers -- aerobic capacity, body composition, muscle strength, endurance and flexibility.

Fairfax County is also developing a version of FITNESSGRAM.

At a training session in Montgomery for physical education teachers this year, McCauley told them that assessments must be conducted in a safe environment, in which nobody feels awkward.

An instructor asked the teachers: "Are we going to run all the obese kids at the same time?"

No one answered. The correct answer, the instructor said, was "no."

At John Carroll Elementary in Landover and Maury Elementary in Alexandria, fourth- and fifth-graders are in their second year of the Mystics in Training program, which was started by Washington Mystics head coach Tree Rollins. Students walk at least a mile each day with their teachers and learn about nutrition. Mystics players also walk once a month with the students as part of the program.

In the District, a nonprofit group started the Kids on Ice program a decade ago to provide free figure skating, hockey and speed skating lessons to economically disadvantaged children. More than 51 public and private schools and after-school care groups participated last year.

Sometimes schools find the right path by accident. Elizabeth Payne, health and physical education coordinator for Fairfax County Public Schools, said that when Woodson High School in Fairfax was under renovation, students were sent to a recreation center, where they were unable to participate in competitive sports. Instead, fitness became the focus. When teachers saw that students were becoming more physically active, they stuck with the fitness education.

Keywords: EDU

Copyright 2008, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

Valerie Strauss Washington Post Staff Writer. "In Some PE Classes, Counting Small Steps To Achieve Fitness." __Washington Post__. 21 May 2008. B01. __eLibrary__. Proquest CSA. GETTYSBURG AREA HIGH SCHOOL. 12 Nov 2008. .