When I was younger I would spend many hours outside in the snow, staying out there until I was forced to come inside. The activities available outside as a kid were endless. As I have gotten older, I no longer feel the urge to go outside or enjoy the snow anywhere near as much as I should. I actually resent it because it makes daily activities and driving that much more time consuming. Over the past year I have started to find out that snowmobiling, as much as I enjoy is not economically feasible at this point therefore I should try new activities.
I started out with ice fishing. I went with friends and I thought if nothing else I would have a good story out of it. I like many others didn't see the point in sitting on a lake covered in ice, cut a hole out, stick a tiny pole into the water and just wait and let me tell you, that's EXACTLY what I did, for 6 hours. During that time, I made some rookies mistakes:
1. I didn't wear warm enough socks
2. My boots were waterproof but are used more for rainy days than standing on ice
3. I "accidentally" threw a fish that was caught back into the hole (it was lying on the ice, suffocating it needed to go back into the hole)
Overall though, it was a good experience, I had fun. I don't think I will become an avid ice fisherman, but I do give those credit who do enjoy it. I appreciated being outdoors and being outside during the winter and how pristine the lake and the trees looked. Ice fishing was the beginning and made me come to the conclusion that I have and probably will spend a greater part of time life in upstate New York, therefore I need a change of attitude and perspective.
There are many activities that are worth trying out and it is not to late for me to take advantage of these different activities and you should too!
Living in Ithaca has allowed me to enjoy the gorges and parks that make this city special. This city is also special in regards to the community. This community is extremely active and provide opportunities for others to enjoy that lifestyle as well. Once winter started I was curious to see how it would affect the community, but I have seen many who enjoy snowshoeing, cross country skiing and also downhill skiing with Greek Peak being nearby. While I have tried these activities before, some more successfully than others, I feel the need to give these activities a try once again. I looked up some sites that could be used and found that the many trails that are used in the summertime for hiking and running also work for snowshoeing. A site that I found helpful was www.trails.com this provides trails all over the US, but can narrow down to states and cities.
My conclusion for this blog, is to not only convince others about how enjoyable the winter can be, but also to convince myself to give it a try. Winter lasts anywhere from 4-8 months depending upon what year or who is telling a story, but it isn't going anywhere fast, so put your boots on and enjoy the great outdoors.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Is it possible to exercise too hard?
For Christmas I received a heart rate monitor, something that I had used in my classes during undergrad and read about all the benefits to improve your fitness. I was eager to use my HR monitor because of the instant feedback it provides you and gives you throughout your exercise.
Up until this point many of the articles I read told exercisers to use somewhat of a Likert scale using gauges such as being able to carry on a conversation means one is exercising at a low aerobic level vs. barely getting words out as working at a high aerobic level. Many machines including the treadmill, elliptical, arc trainer and stationary bikes all have built in heart rate monitors, which I found to be hard to get the machine to find your heart rate and also very inconsistent. I understood what range my heart rate needed to be in to yield specific results, yet I didn't completely understand how hard I actually had to work.
The heart rate monitor has allowed me to see that at times I was actually working harder than 80% of my maximum HR. I am hoping that through using the monitor I will yield more effective workouts and gain more knowledge about fitness.
I also think that HR monitors in schools would be a great addition to Physical Education programs. Many times, administrators and parents don't understand how effort can be graded. It is such a subjective grade that many times we as physical educators don't have any evidence. Using a heart rate monitor and having students record their HR's gives evidence. An article about a teacher implementing HR monitors into his class found that a female in his class was last in the mile run and he thought it was from a lack of effort, after reading her HR monitor it actually showed she was working well within her 60-80% max HR. HR monitors can be used for all domains.
Even though HR monitors are expensive, grants and other funding can be provided for PE programs. Polar, which is one of the leading HR monitor companies has set up a site specifically for educators, check it out: http://education.polarusa.com/education/
Up until this point many of the articles I read told exercisers to use somewhat of a Likert scale using gauges such as being able to carry on a conversation means one is exercising at a low aerobic level vs. barely getting words out as working at a high aerobic level. Many machines including the treadmill, elliptical, arc trainer and stationary bikes all have built in heart rate monitors, which I found to be hard to get the machine to find your heart rate and also very inconsistent. I understood what range my heart rate needed to be in to yield specific results, yet I didn't completely understand how hard I actually had to work.
The heart rate monitor has allowed me to see that at times I was actually working harder than 80% of my maximum HR. I am hoping that through using the monitor I will yield more effective workouts and gain more knowledge about fitness.
I also think that HR monitors in schools would be a great addition to Physical Education programs. Many times, administrators and parents don't understand how effort can be graded. It is such a subjective grade that many times we as physical educators don't have any evidence. Using a heart rate monitor and having students record their HR's gives evidence. An article about a teacher implementing HR monitors into his class found that a female in his class was last in the mile run and he thought it was from a lack of effort, after reading her HR monitor it actually showed she was working well within her 60-80% max HR. HR monitors can be used for all domains.
Even though HR monitors are expensive, grants and other funding can be provided for PE programs. Polar, which is one of the leading HR monitor companies has set up a site specifically for educators, check it out: http://education.polarusa.com/education/
Monday, January 4, 2010
NFL Play 60
The National Football League's Play 60 campaign just recently unveiled a new initiative to increase physical activity among students. The Play 60 campaign is used to inform and motivate children to participate in at least 60 minutes of physical activity a day. With the rising rates of childhood obesity the NFL Network took it upon themselves to get kids healthy and active in their communities.
The NFL’s newest initiative is supporting physical education programs and provides publicity to the ever growing problem of budget cuts that are directly affecting physical education programs and teachers.
The NFL Network and Cox Entertainment have teamed up with the National Association for Sport & Physical Education, President's Challenge & Action for Healthy Kids to create the Keep Gym in School initiative. The mission of the NFL Network is to allow all students the opportunity to be physically active as well as, increase access to in-school physical activity and to teach skills needed to establish and sustain healthy lifestyles. Through the use of monetary grants, middle schools all over the country are eligible through application to receive grants to go towards the improvement of facilities, updating equipment and rejuvenate their physical education programs.
As beneficial as I think that having professional sports programs like the NFL become advocates for the importance of physical education and reveal the problems that PE programs are currently coping with, I cannot help but be disappointed in their use of gym to explain the subject. In the PSA's and some of the other campaigns that are being used, physical education is used to explain teachers, programs and the explanation of the initiative. Unfortunately though, gym is used in the title of campaign that is being seen in most of the NFL facilities, on television and included in all of their advertisements. For many including parents, the use of gym goes back to when they were in children in schools themselves and has stuck as the title of the class.
The public does not understand that the connotation of gym teacher gives the "roll out the ball" perception when we as physical education teachers know that our programs are much more advanced and comprehensive. The fight will continue to change the perception of physical education, but in the end any publicity and advocacy for physical education programs is needed and will hopefully, be very effective.
The NFL’s newest initiative is supporting physical education programs and provides publicity to the ever growing problem of budget cuts that are directly affecting physical education programs and teachers.
The NFL Network and Cox Entertainment have teamed up with the National Association for Sport & Physical Education, President's Challenge & Action for Healthy Kids to create the Keep Gym in School initiative. The mission of the NFL Network is to allow all students the opportunity to be physically active as well as, increase access to in-school physical activity and to teach skills needed to establish and sustain healthy lifestyles. Through the use of monetary grants, middle schools all over the country are eligible through application to receive grants to go towards the improvement of facilities, updating equipment and rejuvenate their physical education programs.
As beneficial as I think that having professional sports programs like the NFL become advocates for the importance of physical education and reveal the problems that PE programs are currently coping with, I cannot help but be disappointed in their use of gym to explain the subject. In the PSA's and some of the other campaigns that are being used, physical education is used to explain teachers, programs and the explanation of the initiative. Unfortunately though, gym is used in the title of campaign that is being seen in most of the NFL facilities, on television and included in all of their advertisements. For many including parents, the use of gym goes back to when they were in children in schools themselves and has stuck as the title of the class.
The public does not understand that the connotation of gym teacher gives the "roll out the ball" perception when we as physical education teachers know that our programs are much more advanced and comprehensive. The fight will continue to change the perception of physical education, but in the end any publicity and advocacy for physical education programs is needed and will hopefully, be very effective.
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