Do schools ban the children from "picking teams" at recess now?

[bluestateguy]

If they even have recess, but that is a discussion for another time.

A friend of mine was telling me that her son's school does not allow the children to pick teams through the old ritual of two captains and all the kids move over here, and the captains take turns publicly picking players. She tells me that her son's school has banned that because the lowly picked kids could have hurt feelings.

Is this a familiar practice in the schools now?

The political correctness in the schools is really getting out of control.

[KittyWampus]

1. The only people who'd criticize that policy are those who never had to endure the humiliation

A good PE teacher would balance the teams with good/poor players and set up the teams herself.

At least if the goal is to actually -teach- teamwork & athletics.

[hlthe2b]

6. +++++++++

Absolutely

[bluestateguy]

10. I have

And when I was picked last or near last, it motivated me to play harder and better, and in due time I was picked earlier and earlier on the ladder.

[KittyWampus]

11. So the bookworm who has no athletic ability should just suck it up, right?

Bad enough to be forced to play some stupid game they have no interest in. But they get to be picked last every time.

UGH.

[Codeine]

108. I was one of those bookworms.

I wish I'd learned to suck it up and develop some athletic abilities sooner. There's nothing positive about embracing a lack of physical effort. Eventually I learned to play tennis well enough to make the varsity team.

[rufus dog]

121. Outstanding

That is a life lesson in three friggin sentences! I am sure you used your intelligence in your tennis game thus taking a potential weakness (athletic ability) and a strength (your intelligence) and channeled both into something that you could enjoy for years!

[alphafemale]

136. lol! Yeah. Getting picked last...does suck. Is there something you can do to change that?

The wisdom of the elders sometimes slaps you in the face doesn't it?

Getting picked last hurts.

Hey! It's supposed to.

Work at Being Better!

[Skidmore]

142. last can also be

the only message you get. not everyone has an alphaego. sorry for typing and punctuation probs. surgery yesterday.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

157. What would an "alphafemale" know? I was always the last picked, and the problem was that

no one ever taught me HOW to become more physically fit.

I grew up believing that people were naturally physically fit or naturally physically unfit, and that there was something defective about me because I couldn't run a mile.

It wasn't until I was in my junior year in college that I had a gym teacher who taught us how to improve our physical fitness.

Before that, gym class was just another opportunity for the self-styled "sharp kids" and the gym teachers to humiliate me.

[alphafemale]

168. And that's where you'd be wrong. I most certainly was picked last...plenty.

I really did suck. And I still have to overcome my natural hand-eye coordination of a club-footed sloth wearing concrete mittens. I'm physically fit though, and I still have fun trying.

Those gym classes were not an exercise in trying to humiliate YOU. They were not there to humiliate ME. WE were not important enough to have our personal humiliation be the purpose of that class. The class was there for kids to blow off some steam and have some fun in the middle of the day.

I got over it and grew up.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

173. That's not how it played out, though

Why is it GOOD to have kids be humiliated?

It did nothing for me but give me a lasting hatred of team sports and the way we worship the students who are good at them.
I spent hours standing in the outfield/on the sidelines/in the backfield with nothing to do, which was in no way good for my physical fitness and was as boring as hell.

I would have benefited much more from the class I FINALLY GOT as a junior in college, the teacher who told the class, "No matter where you are now, you can improve. I will show you how." I wanted to improve, and I did, but only because for the first time I had a teacher who didn't make me feel defective for not keeping up with the jocks.

I think the fact that I finally got some teaching that was helpful instead of humiliating makes me resent the K-12 Darwinian system even more.

[alphafemale]

197. Because it made most people grow the fuck up and do better.

We are just now beginning to reap the results of of a weeny fucking nation.

The results will be joyous, I'm sure.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

216. But I was NOT inspired to improve until I was told how to improve

Nobody ever did. They just made me feel as if being physically unfit was just another way in which I was uncool.

Would it have been any skin off the teachers' noses to say to me and the other less athletic kids, "OK, you can't do it now, but you can work up to it gradually and here's how"?

No, we were just told that we "weren't trying hard enough."

It's like telling people that they're poor because they're "not working hard."

[Name removed]

218. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

219. I am over it, and I am now very fit for my age, but I can still feel empathy

for the kids who are still having teachers reinforce the student pecking order.

There are constructive and non-constructive ways to deal with kids who are doing poorly in ANY endeavor. Public shaming is not one of them.

[Quantess]

222. Lydia, I completely agree with you.

Children can be so horrible to others during competetive sports. I wasn't completely lacking in competetive sports, but I was completely turned off by the pressure, the anxiety, the cruelty, the anger. I hated playing sports.

I was relieved to be allowed to run around the track instead of having to play whatever sport we were playing that day. If there were a reunion, most of those horrible children will have grown into flabby, armchair-sports-fans. But I still go running regularly.

Yes, it often is very humiliating. It isn't fun. Why do we put so much pressure on children to be good at sports? Is it really all that important? I do not believe so.

[shimmergal]

247. I so agree with you and Lydia.

I too hated the "picking teams" process. Funny, they hardly ever did it for indoor things where the criterion was knowledge of subject matter, being able to spell, etc. All of which got me picked early.

But what I hated even more was the relentless emphasis on team sports which featured a ball whishing toward you. My natural reaction was to duck. It wasn't till I got to college that I discovered some P.E. activities that I could actually enjoy: swimming, walking, badminton, bowling, dance. Now my granddaughters are going through the same thing. Fortunately they love their dance classes (NOT school-sponsored) so in spite of required P.E., they're getting wonderful exercise, practice in coordination, and even in teamwork.

Why must all kids aspire to the same cookie-cutter model of athletics? And why should parents have to pay for alternative approaches to physical fitness? Needless to say, many families don't have money to pay for alternatives.

[lolly]

274. Maybe your gym classes weren't

But plenty were.

Many gym teachers are mean and cruel to non-athletic kids.

If math teachers denigrated and insulted students who were bad at math the way many P.E. teachers did, they would be fired.

The "suck it up, get better" mantra is fine if your goal is to weed out the "weak" kids.

If you're actually trying to help kids develop lifelong fitness habit, it is likely to have the opposite effect.

On edit--threading separated this response from earlier comment--the point was supposed to be that many gym classes ARE about humiliation.

And for the previous comment--I absolutely understand about the whizzing balls thing. I had an eye problem that made it impossible for me to "keep my eye on the ball." I got hit several times.

But hey--I should have been happy for the chance to learn how to "suck it up" and try harder, right?

[formernaderite]

296. hate to burst your bubble but all of my teachers were

pretty mean to anyone who didn't "get" what they were teaching. I'm pretty old...so it may be a generational thing. I'd bet the kids are just as mean, rolling their eyes and grunting "ugh" when weaker players are now chosen by the teachers.

[wickerwoman]

202. I was fit and I still got picked last because people thought I was weird and a "dyke".

I was actually a captain on my extramural soccer team but whenever we played at school I still got to sit there and watch everyone else get picked first just to underline that nobody wanted me on their team no matter how good I was.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

165. But here's what happens in real life:

The kid who is unathletic is humiliated by being picked last.

The same kid is last up to bat/sent to stand in the outfield/is told to be goalee/sits on the sidelines. Where is the physical fitness training in that?

[snagglepuss]

211. Exactly. nt

[lolly]

275. Yep.

Once again, if your goal is to keep kids physically fit, the humiliation route is NOT the way to go.

[treestar]

174. Physical effort doesn't have to be team sports though

Athletics are too important in this country.

[Codeine]

184. Judging from the number of enormously fat

and desperately unhealthy children we have in this country I would contend that athletics aren't nearly important enough. Team sports aren't the only path, but hard physical exertion of some sort is an absolute must to develop and maintain long-term fitness and health.

[alphafemale]

198. Oh now hush. The thumbs of all those 300 lb 13 year olds are very well developed.

You know though...actually the kids in my neighborhood are freaks or something. They're outside all the the time riding their bikes all over the place and jumping curbs like little demons. Whatdo they think this is? The Seventies? Kids aren't allowed to play outside anymore are they? What? Does not one of them have a video game?

Kidding.

There's no sweeter spring music than shouting children at play. And that screaming insane joy on the last day of school when they have all those days and possibilities laid out before them,

[LanternWaste]

294. I imagine there are more constructive ways...

I imagine there are more constructive ways than humiliation to empower a child to become more physically fit.

[rpannier]

224. Then they don't have to play the games they have no interest in

The OP did say 'recess'

As to not wanting to do PE...PE is a class, like math, science and art.
I didn't like art. had no interest and am not good at it.
My picture was often one of the worst.
But I still did it

[a la izquierda]

228. Some of us bookworms were jocks, too.

I lettered in 3 sports for four years and graduated 10th in my class. I was a nerd of monumental proportions.

[Bunny]

12. You're awesome.

[SidDithers]

14. +1. Nailed it...nt

Sid

[Hassin Bin Sober]

185. Like the saying goes, "the older I get, the better I was"

[WinkyDink]

18. Well, BULLY....for you.

[pnwmom]

21. And some people just learn to hate sports for the rest of their lives. n/t

[Obamanaut]

44. And others get over it, and go on to have a full life. nt

[alphafemale]

137. And some people lick at at scratch or imagined insult

My dog on occasion needs to wear the "Cone of Shame" because she will obsess about licking a spot on her leg until she wears a gaping wound in it. (We've been to the vet. Nothing is physically wrong with the leg.)

Some people obsess over something that happened in 4th grade and lick a gaping hole in their life.

[Fumesucker]

229. You can hate team sports and still have a full life..

The two things are not mutually exclusive.

[bbdad]

270. As you can see, ...

... alphafemale is a bully. And one of the worst kinds because she's an adult who preys upon children. I wouldn't even give her the time of day.

[Withywindle]

279. Sports are in no way necessary for a full life. n/t

[Cid_B]

36. A mind boggling concept...

... suck less and you won't be last anymore.

Amazing. :wow:

[alphafemale]

186. Well there's a few out there that getting hit in the face during dodgeball ruined their life.

:rofl:

It's not like those soft ass balls were actually going to really hurt anybody more than a tiny sting.

Today's children are soft and spongy and we dare not hurt dere widdle fweelings by saying so.

[Cid_B]

193. I take solace in the fact...

... that my children will dominate their weaker "competitors" in all things, including adulthood.

[alphafemale]

203. Good

The Wimpification of most Americans does bother me though.

[bbdad]

269. Have you ever considered genuine fitness classes ...

... as an alternative to "sports only" P.E. classes, which are actually USELESS for nonathletic kids? Ever hear of PE4Life, for example? Not surprisingly, you show your ignorance regarding what an overweight person must do to lose weight. As a nonathletic boy who endured the mandatory old P.E. during the 1960s, I got no exercise at all. There was hardly any instruction in the sports themselves, and all I and other nonathletic boys learned was to fear coaches and athlete classmates. Several years ago I hired a personal trainer at a health club to begin working on a bodybuilding program. I've been amazed by the results! But in my P.E. classes -- the old P.E. which you so mindlessly defend -- I never even heard the words "exercise program" or "weightlifting" or "bodybuilding." In other words, I know from my own personal experience what works and what DOESN'T work for nonathletic boys.

Are you sure you're not a Republican or a freerepublic troll? You sound like you're a bully who doesn't have the best interests of nonathletic kids at heart. If you're a girls' P.E. coach (heaven forbid), your attitude sums up everything that is wrong with the old P.E. How about developing some compassion instead of looking up to Ilse Koch as your role model? Absolutely pathetic ...

[Withywindle]

284. So why are you on a liberal board?

That makes you sound like an Ayn Rand/Rand Paul/Libertarian forum would be more your speed.

[Vanje]

289. Clearly

There was no Anti-bullying program in your school.

[LeftishBrit]

144. Obviously you had some basic ability there

Many people do not have the physical abilities to play competitive sports (or at least those that are typically on offer at schools); and some have real problems with strength or co-ordination, or are slightly disabled. They are likely just to be 'motivated' to become more efficient at avoiding physical activities.

I don't think that we can or should pretend that some children aren't more physically adept than others. But getting kids to pick teams is going too far - especially as it often involves not just children's perception of their peers' physical abilities, but of their popularity; it is easy for children to use such activities to reward their friends and to bully the fat, unpopular kid.

Better for the teachers to choose school and class teams, IMO; or at least for captains to make their lists in private. I suppose the children still know who has or hasn't been deemed worthy of selection, or who has been assigned to the 'A' team vs 'B' team; but at least the procedure is not as humiliating.

[immoderate]

154. A good analysis.

Choosing up sides, works at the sandlot. I grew up near an actual sandlot baseball field. Informal, no adult influence, a culture grew from kid-initiated social norms which pretty much accommodated whoever came. I remember a lot of discussions and negotiations between kids about what was fair. It was illuminating and educational, but I didn't have much interest in team sports. We lived near the ocean and when the weather was warm, it was swimming and diving and handstands. And then the Frisbee!...

A teacher should avoid students picking other students (except maybe if training in "fairness" was part of the exercise.) However, I was one who was not picked early, and I accepted my ranking in the skill order. The damage is really done to those who don't get picked at all. You can't allow for this possibility within an organized PE program.

--imm

[lolly]

276. One diference, however

Kids aren't required to play sandlot baseball. If they don't like the game, don't like the rules, or feel bullied, they can go home.

In PE, we have bullying and humiliation forced on the kids, sanctioned and encouraged by the adults.

[CreekDog]

194. kind of surprised at how uninterested you are in your topic

:eyes:

[Horse with no Name]

220. and some of the kids it motivates them to be bullies

teaches them that they have control over the weaker ones...and some of the weaker ones DO step up to the plate...sadly sometimes it is done by suicide and sometimes by school shootings.

And oh...I was ALWAYS the kid that got to do the picking. I got to get out of class to help the coach do whatever it is that coaches do. I was the pet...I was the jock...and even still, I saw what it did when kids were picked last.

[Le Taz Hot]

227. So, the kid with physical ailments proventing

him/her from fully participating in physical activity should just "suck it up." M'kay.

[pipi_k]

13. Absolutely!

I was never one of those kids who was good at sports.

I was always one of the last ones chosen.

It really sucked big time to be one of the last ones standing there and seeing the team captains hemming and hawing and trying to decide (with visible disgust on their faces) which one of us rejects wouldn't screw up the game all that much for their team.


What else sucked...

I've had Raynauds since childhood. My hands, due to cold or anxiety, would (and still do, all these years later) get cold and sweaty. And it hurts like hell, but that's another story.

We would have square dancing in fifth and sixth grades once a week. Nobody wanted to hold my hand. They'd grab my wrist. If a kid happened to touch my hand with his own, he'd wipe it off.

It made me more anxious, and I would then sweat even more.


Kids can be so cruel sometimes.

But anyway, yeah. What you said. The ones who never had to deal with being rejected do have the luxury of poo-poo'ing the whole idea of letting the teachers make the choices.

[Withywindle]

280. I have Raynaud's too!

It didn't manifest til later in life...I still have some weird fascination with my cold yellowy corpse-fingers. :D


What I do have that really REALLY hurt me on the school athletic field was a very slight birth defect that affects my balance. No, I'm not visibly disabled, no it doesn't affect me much in daily life--except that none of my years of attempts to learn to ride a bicycle yielded anything more than pain, and I really cannot walk a straight line without consciously focusing on it, dead sober, and high heels are definitely contraindicated, as is anything involving climbing. My parents noticed when I didn't even *attempt* to walk until I was nearly 3. Other than that, I'm fine.

Oh, and it affects my performance in running/catching-based sports too. It's not the sort of thing any child wants attention called to, but some kids will simply NEVER be good enough to be picked anything other than last.

[wtmusic]

16. Eesh. If that's considered humiliation we're in bad shape.

Just give everyone a trophy and send them home (make sure all the trophies are exactly the same size). :eyes:

[pnwmom]

23. It's a popularity contest as much as anything.

At school, I was picked near the end. In my neighborhood, I was picked among the first. My skills were the same -- just the environment was different. I think the difference was that in my neighborhood (where none of my classmates lived), no one had me pegged as a geek -- who, by definition, couldn't be any good at sports.

[wtmusic]

28. I pretty much sucked at sports

and I knew it. Often picked last or next to last.

IMO, it's important for kids to learn that they will suck at some things and excel at others. To also learn that politics and popularity do make a difference, for better or worse.

Coddling does nothing but create false expectations.

[KittyWampus]

29. Teaching the "athletic/popular kids" that the unathletic kids can be valuable players too

is laudable, imo.

[pnwmom]

53. Coddling has nothing to do with it. Do we have the "smart" kids assign grades

to the "dumb" kids?

Why should we have the "athletes" assigning spots on teams to the less athletic?

And even if we did, physical fitness is important for everyone, no matter how athletically talented. Do we want millions of kids to grow up hating sports and fitness because they felt bad on the playground?

[wtmusic]

58. Aye, but there's the rub.

We should be teaching that kids should not feel bad if they're not as athletic as other kids.

Problem solved.

[Drahthaardogs]

87. In moderation, I do not see this as a huge problem.

We are not all created equal physically, mentally, or emotionally. We are good at some things, not to good at others. Some of our strengths are valued by some, not at all by others. Life will have cliques that must be dealt with on a daily basis. There are some lessons to be learned here. Tough yes, but not necessarily wrong lessons. You cannot protect your children from life.

[treestar]

178. What's "coddling" about it

And why it is necessary to learning you will suck at some things and be good at others?

How is a child supposed to understand that when they seem to be good at nothing at any given point? To a child the future isn't really all that meaningful.

[wtmusic]

208. There isn't any child who is good at nothing

just as there isn't any child who is good at everything.

It probably seems that way to most kids at some point, but that's where parenting comes in.

Pointing out to kids that they will be better at some things than others is healthy - and most importantly, honest.

[treestar]

239. Everyone is going to figure it out some way

They don't need this team picking crap to learn that.

Teachers shouldn't pick some kid to start it. If it happens spontaneously at recess, then that's on those who allowed others to get them to agree to it. The kids picked last could just quit, since there's no compulsion.

[lolly]

277. Define "coddling"

It would be "coddling" if we told kids that they didn't have to try if they weren't any good, or told them they were good when they weren't.

"Coddling" is not synonymous with "preventing bullying."

[WolverineDG]

191. Newsflash: Life is a popularity contest

coddling kids does nothing but teach them that life is fair. It's not.

If you don't learn how to handle that as a child, you're not going to be able to handle it as an adult.

I was always one of the ones picked last. Except when we had to pick teams in class for academic challenges. Then the captains fought to have me on their team.

dg

[ScreamingMeemie]

34. You are confusing two things. Keeping score has nothing to do with

picking teams. I cannot stand those sports organizations that don't keep score. But picking teams is not keeping score. It's about picking friends and popular kids. If I recall we were not awarded trophies at all for participating in gym class. And I'll raise your :eyes:

[wtmusic]

37. Why do we teach kids to rely so much on popularity for self-esteem?

That's what I want to know.

[ScreamingMeemie]

46. Why do we set them up in popularity contests when there is nothing

to gain from it?

[wtmusic]

49. There's a lot to be gained from it.

1) Popularity does not equal self-esteem.
2) Being poor at athletics does not make you a bad person.
3) Making friends with popular people can be advantageous.
4) Being picked last, practicing some skills, then next time being picked next to last is a tremendous source of encouragement (requires some assistance).

Why should we deny kids these valuable lessons?

[ScreamingMeemie]

51. 13 year olds who commit suicide is a great lesson. Sorry, but if

a problem can be averted it should be. It does not affect the outcome of the game and no, there is nothing to be gained by a child consistently being told by his/her peers that he/she sucks (whether talented or not). The funny thing is, is that I was an excellent basketball, softball, football player. That doesn't trump being the new kid. Kids should never be used as a "lesson".

[wtmusic]

54. Not one 13-year-old has committed suicide for not being picked for a team.

Ever.

Maybe we should be addressing the harrassment and bullying instead of giving kids false expectations?

[pnwmom]

60. You can't say that. A child who is repeatedly chosen last, over an extended

period of time, could have that reaction, depending on how the rest of his or her life is going.

[wtmusic]

64. Then the problem is with the rest of her life.

Thinking you can avert suicide by avoiding such a minor disappointment is nonsense.

[ScreamingMeemie]

67. Yet, you have people here telling you it wasn't a minor disappointment

for them. Again, what should I have done differently? I was talented at sports. Should I have made my father not move? Was it somehow my fault for being a new kid? I should have blended in better? Honestly....

[wtmusic]

71. And yet they're alive to tell the tale.

I guess they weren't as fragile as they thought. :)

[ScreamingMeemie]

Some of them are. Some of them are not.

https://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/profile.php?id=100001299319380

http://itemonline.com/obituaries/x993489797/Harley-Rae-Wilson

[wtmusic]

82. Harley committed suicide for not being picked for a team?

Source, please.

[ScreamingMeemie]

85. Harley committed suicide over a bunch of things. Being ostracized

at school, and by her teammates was one of them. Of course she should have bucked up. It is attitudes such as yours that are such an endangerment to suicide prevention.

[pnwmom]

89. I am so, so sorry, ScreamingMeemie.

This would have me screaming, too.

[pnwmom]

88. Boy, you really are heartless.

Do you really think they're going to put something like that in an obituary?

[wtmusic]

92. Oh cry me a river.

I'll bet Harley could have seen through that false, pandering sympathy in a moment.

I'm done.

[ScreamingMeemie]

94. "false pandering sympathy"...where was that?

Get help, quickly.

[Bunny]

96. You're done?

Thank god.

[Withywindle]

283. In theory, if you're a liberal, you probably deplore Ayn Randian social Darwinism for adults.

But you think it's OK among children? :shrug:



Childhood is when the future Repukes learn it's OK to humiliate and dismiss the (physically, socially) weaker ones, as long as authority winks and sanctions it. Which it all too often does.

[pnwmom]

91. Have you ever heard the expression, "the straw that broke the camel's back."

But for an athlete, this wouldn't even be a straw. It might be more like a bat.

[Bunny]

95. Stop.

Just stop.

[wtmusic]

98. You're funny.

:D

[Bunny]

100. I thought you were done?

:D

[wtmusic]

101. Your arrogance was a target I couldn't resist.

Bye. :hi:

[Pithlet]

139. Oh yeah. That faulty logic rears its head again.

It's like those who think they're alive even though they never wore a helmet, so helmets are useless. Uhhhhh.......

[ScreamingMeemie]

65. This is why it is so hard to educate people on suicide awareness.

Thanks so much pnwmom. :hi:

[pnwmom]

84. It's hard to believe some of these reactions.

Why would anyone advocate for a procedure like this that can discourage and hurt children and has no benefits?

And you're welcome.

[RobinA]

102. I'm Damned Surprised

myself. I didn't think anyone these days actually thought team-picking was a good idea. I wasn't even the last one picked and I thought it was godawful. It's barbaric.

[Taitertots]

It encourages all the children whose abilities deserve being picked first

So it clearly has a benefit.

[immoderate]

158. It gives encouragement only to those who don't need it. Awesome!

And it's self-selecting. :)

--imm

[Taitertots]

162. The exceptional need and deserve encouragement just as much as the inferior n/t

[immoderate]

195. At whose expense? Not that their particular deficiencies can't be addressed.

And they should. But first, do no harm!

--imm

[ScreamingMeemie]

62. You don't know that, nor do I. I would hedge a guess that being picked

last has led to this. I work in suicide awareness. What is trivial to you is exactly what causes the problem that I am fighting to gain awareness on. Yes, 13 year olds do commit suicide because they are ostracized at school. At 13, as part of the harassment that included constantly being picked last along with comments of "Do we have to have her on our team?" led to very real thoughts of suicide on my part. Again. You haven't answered my question, nor addressed the fact that it is not only those who should somehow strive harder to be better who are affected by this. It is so very, very easy to line kids up and count by twos. There is NOTHING to be gained by popularity contests and children should never be used as lessons.

[wtmusic]

69. Then the problem is harrassment, not the important life lesson

which is learned by accepting your strengths and weaknesses.

What do you say to the kids who grow up, lose out competing for a job, then jump off a bridge because they were taught to think they had the same talents as everyone else?

Are you taking responsibility for them?

[ScreamingMeemie]

74. So...my weakness was moving then? And I should have forced my

father not to move for his job? A team sport is not a job. Jobs are not given out based upon picking sides... Sides are not picked by grade school idiots evaluating their potential teammates strengths and weaknesses... I could go on but you are deliberately choosing to be obtuse by not answering my very simple question in how I could have improved. Children should never be used as lessons for others.

[wtmusic]

78. Everyone has thoughts of suicide. Join the club.

That also is part of growing up.

[ScreamingMeemie]

81. I'd rather not. I'd rather work for awareness. It didn't save my husband,

but it may save someone else's husband/father/child/loved one. You need to back up on that comment. It is comments like yours that make the battle that much harder. Thoughts of suicide should also not be a part of growing up.

[wtmusic]

86. You have it exactly backwards.

It's unrealistic expectations - teaching that everyone is equal - teaching that life is fair - that set up people for suicide.

I think we're just going to have to disagree on this.

[ScreamingMeemie]

90. That's not what I am saying and you know it.

I'm going to do more than agree to disagree with you. I'm going to respect you just a little bit less.

Sorry... it is not an unrealistic expectation. Nowhere is anyone saying treat everyone the same. Don't leave picking teams in the hands of those who will use it as a tool to ostracize. Don't use children as lessons. It's really that simple.

[pnwmom]

107. Destroying children's self-esteem sets them up for suicide.

Schools are hard enough on a lot of children anyway. They don't need to add absolutely pointless team-picking procedures to the indignities children experience every day.

[Horse with no Name]

221. Exactly. Teachers hand back graded papers upside down

so that the grades aren't seen by the other kids--yet, someone not being as athletically talented is laid bare for all to see.

There is a HUGE difference.

[LeftishBrit]

290. Teaching people that it's perfectly OK when life isn't fair may be setting them up to be right wing

Teaching people that life isn't fair but SHOULD be made fairer, and that all SHOULD be treated equally well, may set them up to be progressives.

[pnwmom]

105. I think that's the problem here. This poster is seriously misinformed.

S/he has had thoughts of suicide, so s/he thinks everyone else has.

[pnwmom]

103. If you think that, that may be the problem.

You dismiss children with those feelings because you're already dismissed those feelings in yourself.

Well guess what? Most people DON'T have thoughts of suicide -- especially children. When a child does have those thoughts, it's an extremely serious situation.

[pnwmom]

99. Why is this so hard for you to understand?

Being picked last has little to nothing to do with accepting your strengths and weaknesses. Just because some team captain picks you last doesn't mean you DESERVE to have been picked last. It might mean that your hair is too kinky -- like mine -- that you're a new kid, that your parents are gay, that you're the wrong race, or you had a seizure in the lunchroom last week, or any number of reasons that have NOTHING to do with your athletic "strengths and weaknesses."

And so you're picked last, based on factors you have absolutely no control over and cannot change. What kind of lesson is that teaching a kid?

[woo me with science]

169. It's okay. Someone has a different opinion than you do.

You will be okay. I promise. :rofl:

[RobinA]

106. It Isn't About

differing talents, it's about public humiliation. Being told you suck at something in front of peers at a rather young age.

[wtmusic]

209. That's not what is happening here.

Kids are being picked in order of preference by team captains. A good teacher will point out that because one team captain doesn't pick you, that's his/her opinion and might have nothing to do with your ability.

You're confusing humiliation with disappointment. Extremely important for kids to learn how to deal with disappointment at a young age.

[LeftishBrit]

146. Fair enough

But the public picking of teams in order of preference does easily give rise to harrassment and bullying.

Unlikely that anyone has committed suicide just because they weren't picked for a team; but feeling unpopular or constantly sneered at *can* have that result

Selection occurs in lots of areas of life, but it can be humiliating, or just a fact of life, depending on how it's handled. A child may be placed in a top set, or a lower set, for maths or French for example (I'm not at present addressing the controversies about streaming vs. mixed-ability grouping); but this is not done by having the top-performing kids shout out, in order, which of their peers they want to have in the top set, based on a mixture of perceived ability and popularity.

[Cid_B]

150. New Plan...

All children will be placed in some of these except mine will be soundproof and solidly coloured so as to keep them from anything that may make them sad or disapointed or hurt their feelings. An organic vegan diet will be deposited so there are no "bad vibes".

At age 18 they will be released to the work force... Good plan no? I can't see this backfiring at all...

[woo me with science]

164. LOL!

Nice pic.

[pnwmom]

57. "Being picked next to last is a tremendous source of encouragement"?

:rofl:

[wtmusic]

59. Yes, it's called "improvement".

Ring a bell? :rofl:

[pnwmom]

63. No, it's arbitrary.

Kids often move back and forth around the bottom. Just because you got encouraged going from the equivalent of an F to a D minus minus doesn't mean most kids would feel that way.

But you have the idea that this team-picking is objectively measuring something real related to athletic abilities -- rather than to looks or other measures of popularity. My athletic ability was exactly the same, whether I was playing at school or in my neighborhood. But at school, my nickname was "Brillo" (because of my hair). At home, I was just called by my name. Do you think it was just a coincidence that at school, the "Brillo" girl was among the last picked, while in my neighborhood I was among the first?

It's about popularity as much as anything else, and the schools are right to not be reinforcing that.

[wtmusic]

66. Life is arbitrary.

Jeezus, you must live around kids who are made of glass. This is silly.

[JVS]

70. And the decision on assigning teams not being done by the kids is an arbitrary decision.

Deal with it.

[pnwmom]

75. You're the one pretending that this team-picking teaches something important

other than that, given the chance to choose teams, kids will usually favor their own friends.

And I fail to see why the schools should be reinforcing that message.

[LeftishBrit]

291. 'Life' in this sense is not an abstract force.

'Life' includes how people treat others. This can be changed.

If everyone just accepted that 'life is arbitrary' and 'unfair' and that is that, there would never be any political or social progress.

[JVS]

68. I've unrecced a lot of shitty posts here, it never seems to lead to improvement by the posters.

[muriel_volestrangler]

156. Congrats, you have just won the thread

And, since we're all adults here, I don't see picking you out as especially good as being a problem for others. :)

[lumberjack_jeff]

128. Tell you what. We're forming a modelling program.

You're obliged to compete in it, no way out and in fact your pay will be based on how few or many women laugh at you.

You can't get out of it, old timer. If you had any sense of self motivation, you'd get younger and more attractive.

[Withywindle]

285. Honorary DUzy! I wish we still had them.

Speaking as a chronically-chosen-last kid, what I hated most was the fact that participation in this BS was MANDATORY.

(Really - people really get so worked up about a piece of leather with air in it? And I was supposed to care enough about a piece of leather with air in it to work at getting better at it even though it bored me shitless, and grovel at the feet of my self-appointed "superiors" so they might pick me 4th to last instead of last? REALLY? Why? No one ever managed to convince me why this was worth my time in any way.)

But yeah. The standard of judging is as arbitrary as a beauty contest when you let kids do it. (Not that it's necessarily any better when overly-invested adults do it, but at least they theoretically have some legal responsibility.)

[LeftishBrit]

179. Thing is though that...

Many kids will learn the 'valuable' lessons that
1) Popularity DOES equal self-esteem.
2) Being poor at athletics DOES make you a bad person.
3) Making friends with unpopular or weak people is a disadvantage, so avoid such people and suck up to the popular or 'successful' (at least that's good training for a future Republican or Tory politician)
4) Being physically active is a source of humiliation. Much better to dodge such activities and be as sedentary as possible.

[JVS]

52. For many kids school is the first place where they have to deal with people outside of the family,..

and the supportive environment that families try to foster for their young.
For me it was. Even church and sunday school were only like a halfway house on the way to such an environment because everyone knew each other and formed a tight community.
School can both allow the child to operate as an individual (they don't have to conform to the authority of a parent or of the community to behave with kindness) while at the same time stripping away the support that those systems involve. The desire for popularity is the desire to establish oneself inside the disordered community. Good teachers are the ones who bring out the solidarity and sense of community among the students.

[FreakinDJ]

39. Accept this is RECESS not PE class

so where do you draw the line

Tell them who to date when they enter High School

[a la izquierda]

230. THANK YOU!

I thought I was the only one who caught that. My PE teachers NEVER let us pick teams, and though I was never picked last on the playground, I always felt back for my Enrichment Courses (gifted nerds) classmates who did get picked at the bottom.

What a lifetime of sports did make me, though, was super competitive. In some ways, this is good (you have to be competitive to get a PhD and make it in high academics); however, I can't even ride my bike without having an urge to compete that borders on unhealthy.

[PassingFair]

254. The kids at my daughter's school played "Survivor" at recess. She was "voted off the island"...

on the first day and was ostracized for WEEKS before
I found out about it.

You think that's OK?

I had her taken out of "recess" and given a "job"
with the little kids in latchkey kindergarten.

She is in college now, has friends and does well
but she still doesn't even
like to DRIVE BY her old schools.

[Withywindle]

288. Maybe in your school.

In mine, recess became completely equated with PE class after 2nd or 3rd grade. I used to love playing with friends in the grassy yard with monkeybars and slides and hills that was reserved for the "little" kids, but after age 8, all our recesses took place on the "hardtop" and they were all mandatory team sports ruled by little Caligula captains.


I still fucking hate team sports. The only one I can stand to watch is soccer and that's because I was never forced to play it.

[Obamanaut]

47. There is a difference between recess where kids go willy-nilly and

a PE class with a real PE teacher to guide/control/direct.

[Hippo_Tron]

56. Our PE teachers would allow about 5 or 6 picks and then start assigning

So that nobody was picked last. I remember one time I got to be team captain and while I passed over the superstars for some fairly average people, so that they superstars could get a taste of what it's like to not get picked.

[Pithlet]

140. Yes, and everyone who is spewing the bullshit that kids just need to get better

don't know what they're talking about. I wasn't bad at sports at all. In fact, there were certain sports I excelled at. And I was STILL often picked last because I was often a target of bullies, and this was one effective way to humiliate.

[Warrior Dash]

231. Sound like a plan to me. No need to teach them about choices.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Sounds reasonable to me.

Sucks to be the kid who's picked last all the time - there are better ways of forming teams than letting the popular jocks pick their buddies and leaving the same nerds and klutzes feeling like fools and rejects every time.

[ScreamingMeemie]

3. I see no problem with 1, 2, 1, 2-ing it, instead of picking teams.

Picking teams was a horrible aspect of my childhood. We moved a lot and it's hard to make friends when you are the new kid. Why set kids up to feel like shit? I hated gym class because I, an unknown, was always picked last. I applaud schools that don't allow picking of teams. It's just as easy to call off numbers. It's not "pc", it's just plain nice.

[KittyWampus]

4. That's why when I got to pick my phys ed class I took fitness & dance.

Even though I could hit/catch softball I HATED the assholes who were always captain.

[ScreamingMeemie]

9. That's the thing. I was pretty good at sports.

I did the same as you, and took dance in high school.

[Quantess]

259. You mean the ones who scream at you when you drop the ball?

Jump up and down emitting spittle because you couldn't hit the volleyball in the right direction? Yell at you like you were the most vile creature on earth for not meeting the bat to the softball?

Yeah, no thanks. I'll take track & field instead. Jerks.

[hlthe2b]

5. I don't know... I can recall this being the impetus for lots of

ridicule and bullying when I was growing up. The gawky kids, the overweight kids, the new kids.... the fact that they were not chosen was undoubtedly hurtful, but not nearly as bad as the teasing that moved into cruelty at times. I was at least marginally athletic and was usually chosen sometime in the middle of the pack, but I can remember how painful those episodes were to a childhood friend who wore thick glasses and was a little chubby.

I can understand the concern about schools going overboard on the PC stuff, but I'm not sure this is a bad one. Kids have enough trouble with self-esteem without this.... Just my thoughts...:shrug:

[Orangepeel]

7. are you thinking that picking teams is some sort of character building exercise?

I don't get why it is out of control PC to stop what seems to me to be a pointless practice if it might hurt some feelings. Is there a reason to do it other than that it might be easier for the gym teacher?

[NYC_SKP]

8. Problems with the traditional "pick two captains" and let them play God...

Is that it is a demonstration of the exceedingly unfair social practice of anointment by those in power to the favored ones, endowing these few individuals with similar powers to identify more popular kids.

Many would say, "Well, this teaches them to be tough and what it's like to be an adult in the real world." and I say "bullshit" and "fuck that shit".

Plenty of societies don't play it that way at all.

Good for the schools that ban it, but I hope they haven't replaced it with anything stupid, there are a lot of progressive ways to team up and other ways that are just random.

:patriot:

[davepc]

32. Not like the skilled kids are going to throw the ball to the unskilled ones anyways

So the net result will be minimal and cosmetic. The less able kids will still be ostracized by their peers, just in different ways.

[Name removed]

15. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[demmiblue]

33. I am guessing that many people here consider themselves nerds...

in one way or another. You are going to have to bash a whole lot of people.

Nerdish tendencies are a good thing!

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

134. What do you do for a living?

[WinkyDink]

17. This is not "political correctness."

[Name removed]

19. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[sakabatou]

20. I don't know

When I was in school, we always got to pick teams (at least for official sports).

[Brickbat]

22. Wow, that was quite a leap from the school of the son of a friend of yours, to "the political

correctness in the schools." Like, all across the NATION?

You must have been picked first for long jump every time.

[JVS]

24. Schools tell kids what to do, as they should.

[wtmusic]

25. The whole "winning and losing" thing can be very unfair too.

What does a losing team do to deserve losing (besides losing)?

In the future all kids will be on the same team, playing against a virtual team which always loses. Everyone wins!

[KittyWampus]

26. What does always being picked last "teach"?

Being forced to play a game you're no good at? Never getting actually coached so you can possibly play better?

Is that supposed to build moral fiber?

Why is the concept of a gym teacher balancing sides herself so there's good and bad players on both so abhorrent or pc?

[Obamanaut]

41. Life is unfair. Can you imagine the uproar if the 'A' students have to give part of their

grade to the 'D' students so everyone can have a 'C', making everyone simply 'average'?

[wtmusic]

45. You will not believe this, but it happened.

Los Angeles County holds a Math Field Day every year in which schools throughout the county participate in teams, sending their best students.

Well...someone, somewhere decided that excluding bad math students from the teams was hurtful to the other kids. So an entirely separate class of competition was created for kids with a C average.

I kid you not.

The bizarre result of this was some schools had their best math students deliberately do poorly on tests so that they could put them on the "C" team. My kids' school and probably twenty others boycotted the competition. That policy was short-lived.

[PassingFair]

255. We should probably do away with the Special Olympics while we're at it...

can't have THOSE losers thinking they're something special!

WTF is wrong with you?

[demmiblue]

50. Seriously? Holy shite!

:rofl:

[csziggy]

73. Well, in one of my classes the teacher let students pick working partners

And every time went alphabetically, starting with "A". Even though when I worked alone I was an "A" student, I was not popular and with my name being at the end of the alphabet, I was generally left for the last but one student to pair with.

Although I didn't have anything against this kid, I hated always being paired with him. He didn't study, was never prepared and always brought my grade down at least one letter. It was not as though we could get together out of school to study, even if either of us wanted to work together.

Eventually about half way through the school year I blew up and refused to work with him. I did my lesson alone and for the first time that year got a perfect score. The kid that had been my forced partner failed - he had counted on me helping him so he could get the barely passing score that he considered acceptable.

After that, the teacher set up a system for randomly selecting partners. By the end of the year, some of the students realized that every time they were paired with me, their scores went up so they were nicer to me.

So it is not just athletics where picking teams can be a bad idea.

By the way, I sucked at sports so I was always the last picked for any team. I didn't care about that - I hated sports. I spent some of my best recess time out in left field watching the birds and ignoring the game.

[immoderate]

163. I've done it. As you say life is not fair.

But that was not my aim. I was using cooperative education strategies, which encourages students to teach each other. You have to build to this, but I conducted activities where all the members of a group would receive the lowest mark scored by a member. This meant that the smartest kid in the group would have to be sure that all the group knew what he/she knew before evaluation.

When properly done, it is fantastic. By properly done, I guess I mean you must structure the activity to succeed. Think of all the benefits beyond just some kids getting it.

--imm

[LeftishBrit]

188. I think you're confusing two things..

(1) Avoiding all competition, by not allowing anyone to win or lose in sports

(2) Avoiding the situation where kids publicly pick their friends/POSSIBLY the best athletes for teams, and some children are publicly rejected.

Although I think that children should have an option for non-competitive sports at least some of the time, I would agree that avoiding any situation where a child might lose a game is over the top. But that is different from the public team-picking and exclusion. Learning to win and lose gracefully *is* one part of life. Learning to humiliate the 'nerds', or be humiliated for being a 'nerd', is not - unless you want a society run by bullies (which the Right essentially do, of course).

In an academic context, would you consider it appropriate to give the A pupils the right to hand out the grades to others on the basis of perception of ability combined with friendship?

[WolverineDG]

192. Oh, but they're already doing that

by doing away with the National Honor Society, as well as class valedictorians, salutatorians, & A & A-B Honor Rolls.

dg

[backscatter712]

27. That practice is pretty humiliating for the kid that always gets picked last. n/t

[virgogal]

35. Many years ago when I was a young,idealistic first grade teacher

I decided to have the kids that were always the last chosen be the captains and select their team members.

They chose the popular kids first.

[bluestateguy]

207. That is actually a very good remedy

In my experience, they chose the big athletic kids first, whether or not they are popular.

[tabbycat31]

30. they should in PE class

If it is anything like it was when I was in school (graduated 1998) we spent half the class picking teams and hardly got a workout at all.

It turned the non athletes off from sports probably forever. And people wonder why kids these days are so fat. What about emphasizing individual fitness habits that can last for a lifetime instead of forcing team sports every day where in many cases you barely move around (such as waiting for an at bat).

[Kat45]

83. I also think they should emphasize individual fitness

instead of team sports. I'm totally non-athletic and it would have helped me tremendously, and saved a lot of bad feeling, if it had been done that way.

[ScreamingMeemie]

109. We are lucky, in my son's district, that they have moved to more

individual fitness (i.e. running, strength and conditioning). Those who choose to play team sports select to when schedules (this is a middle school) are made mid year for the next year. My son participates in some sports, and then does strength and conditioning in the "off season".

[Lydia Leftcoast]

166. Yes, I would have ENJOYED swimming and race-walking, for example

But no, it was always soccer, softball, basketball, volleyball, and badminton, none of which I'm good at (even when I was a runner--before wrecking my knees--I was never very fast, and my eye-to-hand coordination and depth perception are terrible), and no chance for the kids who might be good at individual sports.

[FrodosPet]

257. Unfortunately, most people consider sports more fun

Doing pushups and running laps is hard and boring, which is probably why sports teams and the military use them as punishment.

It CAN be pretty cool when you are picked last and then make the game winning catch, or knock loose a fumble, and become the hero. Unfortunately, it is pretty rare. Usually, you just drop the ball or strike out.

[smokey nj]

266. I agree with you 100%.

[catrose]

31. Good for the school

from a chronically last picked kid.

I was surprised in my son's school, a private school for kids with disabilities, that they allowed kids to hand out invitations to birthday parties in class--but not all kids had to be invited. Silly me: I told my son that he either had to invite the whole class (all 12 of them) or send invitations. Finding out later that he was also frequently left out of other people's invitations made me furious.

[Obamanaut]

42. It is totally unfair that only a few are picked to be Rhodes scholars.

:sarcasm:

[pnwmom]

77. Who's picking the Rhodes scholars? Are friends picking their own friends

for that now, too?

[Obamanaut]

97. This is an example of how unfair life is. Only the smart ones get the

scholarship to Oxford. Why not some of the below average to average. UNFAIR!

I was looking at a boating magazine in the Dr office waiting room today. My retirement income disallows me from having the $89,000 boat I saw in it. UNFAIR!

[pnwmom]

110. Since when is team-picking based on pure athletic ability?

Instead of kids picking their friends and other popular kids.

[Obamanaut]

112. Generally speaking, elementary age children have limited athletic

skills - especially the ones playing games at recess. Kids become skilled via the organized leagues, teams, and games other than those played during a 15 minute recess during the school morning or afternoon.

A sixth grade class president is chosen not because of familiarity with SCOTUS decisions but because he or she is popular or cute.

It is part of growing up. People learn to make decisions based on their own mistakes as they mature. Learning to select based on substance or skill rather than cute is part of that.

[catrose]

141. If I want to audition

for a part in the play, for a place on the dance team, to sing or play a solo--even apply for a job--that's a different thing than being forced to take part daily in something I'm no good at, where nobody wants me. As a young child--and an adult--I did those auditions. Sometimes I won. Sometimes I lost. Losing an audition was never the humiliation that waiting to be picked for teams was.

Life's tough enough without random cruelty and thoughtlessness from schools. I'd like to think that they're modeling virtues and values, though that turns out often not to be the case.

I'm not sure why anyone thinks that not being able to afford something is the same thing. The poor, funny dressed kids were also in the undesirable group--I don't know why they should have their status ground into them every day either.

[Bodhi BloodWave]

242. who is forcing you to take part in something during recess tho?

Now unless things are different in the US compared to Norway then most kids tended to decide what they wanted to do in the time between classes, and if somebody is lets say bad as speed but good at strength then they should expect being picked close to last on any speed based games while being close to the start on strength based games IF the said kid decides he wants to play the game

If said kid knows he isn't to fast and the game is focused on speed then he has three choices basically: 1: join in knowing he isn't going to do to well and likely be picked late, or 2: decide to play with somebody else, 3: decide to play alone or read a good book

[catrose]

265. Actually, it was required at my school, whether recess or gym class

Oh, I would have loved to have the choices you mention. I'm not sure why you think I'd be stupid enough to voluntarily expose myself to daily humiliation.

[Withywindle]

287. "Recess" in US schools is very regimented.

It's not free playtime once you get past age 7 or so. Whatever the "curriculum" of the day is (usually team sports) is just as mandatory as the curriculum of the day's math class or spelling class.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

167. And that's what's wrong with our political system

People vote for the candidate they "like," not the one who will do the best job.

[LeftishBrit]

172. The difference is...

that no one is FORCED to try to get into Oxford (incidentally some less than smart people have managed that; look at David Cameron!), or to become a professional sportsperson, or a concert pianist, or Bill Gates, etc. Not very many people are going to afford an 89000 dollar boat. However, sports is compulsory at most schools. If it's compulsory, then everyone should be included and not systematically humiliated.

I have no problem with schools having some serious top teams, which only include those who are very good at sports. However, forcing children to take part in an activity and then regularly humiliating them over it, is only going to put them off physical activities at best, damage their personalities at worst. The 'big fish', who get to pick and choose publicly, also risk having their personalities damaged, in the sense of becoming arrogant (and perhaps thus set up for a fall later on when they are not in such a 'small pond') or even bullies.

[LeftishBrit]

182. The two would only be equivalent...

if
(a) Rhodes scholars were picked by other Rhodes scholars as part of a popularity contest
(b) everyone was required to try to be a Rhodes scholar, and those who didn't make it were constantly sneered at and publicly humiliated.

I have no problem with some people being specially recognized for their sporting prowess, and being selected for top teams. It's when EVERYONE is required to participate in sport, and the same time publicly humiliated for not being good at it or just for not being popular with the team captains, that it becomes a problem.

It's not 'elitism' that bothers me; it's the regular humiliation of the less able. Yes, life isn't fair; but surely part of being politically left-wing is to try to make it that bit fairer.

[WinkyDink]

199. This is the definition of "specious argument."

[Obamanaut]

214. Would 'example' be more accurate than 'definition'? nt

[Obamanaut]

38. I've read this before. Some schools do not allow teachers to put failing

grades on assignments, others disallow the use of red pens for grading (red is a 'harsh' color and can be hurtful to little Timmy's self esteem.

No dodge-ball, no red rover red rover send Timmy right over, no swing sets. The whole system has gone bonkers.

[ScreamingMeemie]

48. A red pen mark has nothing to do with peer punishment in choosing

sides. Some are getting confused here. Choosing sides can become a horrific bullying experience. That has absolutely nothing to do with grading papers...scoring games...etc. It's not even about being politically correct. It's about a stupid outdated mode of forming teams that does nothing but reinforce "social standing".

[Obamanaut]

80. It's about little Timmy not feeling good. No red pen, no failing grade, no

dodge ball, no getting picked first.

Self esteem issues might even keep him out of pro football or baseball. That, or he just cannot play.

Maybe Timmy should be given a scholarship to Oxford to make him feel good about himself. Oh, he's not smart enough? UNFAIR!

[ScreamingMeemie]

93. Two different things. A grade given by a teacher, based on work that

he did versus kids picking one over another based more on whether they like them or not than their ability. Sorry, apples to oranges. I'll stand next to you in line as we fight against equalizing grades and not keeping scores, but I see nothing wrong with assigning teams...done by adults.

[WinkyDink]

200. since you repeat yourself, I will: SPECIOUS.

[JVS]

40. Maybe I just had good teachers, but generally the teachers would decide how teams were chosen...

with an eye on what kind of mood was prevailing among the students. If the class seemed to be getting along well, then maybe a couple captains would be chosen and they'd pick. Other times the teachers would have us count off. Often if students were picking teams, the teacher would intervene around half way through (after all the heavy hitters) had been chosen and just send half of the remaining kids one way and half the other. One thing I never did see is a teacher allow painstaking deliberation. The point of picking teams was to play the game, not to rank the participants.


Even in my academic teaching, I find it useful to vary up methods of choosing "captains" or assigning groups myself depending on the task I need students to perform and the balancing of weak and strong students.

[Enrique]

43. we already went through this in the 1990s

the culture wars, the end of civilization due to political correctness, etc.

[Obamanaut]

55. It's just like politics. We are told to vote for candidate X because he or she

is intelligent, experienced, educated, literate, and articulate.

We are told to shun the ones who are not those things.

This is a 'recess' for grown-ups with the well being of the world at stake. Picking the ones with all those quals hasn't really gone all that well, considering the shape the world is in now. Maybe we should start picking the less intelligent, inexperienced, semi educated, inarticulate (well, we did that one already) and the barely literate to run the government.

That should satisfy all the people who cry 'unfair' because their kids aren't picked for dodge-ball, and make up for their own misery in the elementary school playground.

[demmiblue]

61. Young children vs. adults... duh. n/t

[Obamanaut]

72. One would think the adults would know better, huh....duh But no, we

keep picking the smart ones hoping for change.

[WinkyDink]

201. This is now bizarre. Are you seriously suggesting we vote for the UNintelligent? The UNeducated?

Are you trying to equate a child's rejection by his known small group of peers to a politician's loss to unknown masses?

[Obamanaut]

262. A similar kind of contest. At recess the small, unathletic, unpopular kids are picked last, while

the popular, the cute, the athletic are the first chosen.

We pick our leaders in the same way. The popular, the (sometimes) gook looking, the articulate, the intelligent, the well educated. We do this because we hope that they will do the best job.

It appears, from the sad state of the US in particular and the world in general, picking the intelligent, articulate, well educated, etc. hasn't been working out as well as we had hoped. Now, is that an indicator that we should start picking our leaders from the average, the lower than the cream of the crop, the less well read, the inarticulate?

Can't see how the shitstorm we are in can get worse, so maybe it's worth a try. Perhaps instead of graduates from Oxford, or a Big Ten school, or an Ivy League college we should choose from some community college or a lesser known state school.

We pick our leaders in the same way teams were picked in elementary school. Often it is show but little substance. Where once we made our selection based on what kind of car his mom delivered him to school in, or how cute he is, or how her hair is always done so nicely now we base it on what school he attended, how well she sounded at the fund raiser, or did you see how lovely they looked as they danced.

[likesmountains 52]

76. The kids all know who is 'cool" and who is not..no need to point it out to them. I remember SRA

reading groups in the 1950s. Each group of readers had a name like "robins" "sparrows' "wrens"...but everyone knew what group the good readers were in,and what group the slower readers were in. I think you can be as PC or supportive as you want, but the kids still know.

[pnwmom]

79. They might now, but the schools don't have to reinforce it.

Allowing a couple of popular athletes to divide up teams based on their friends accomplishes nothing good.

[FLPanhandle]

104. Yep, these kids are really going to ready for the real world.

I can hear them now "What everyone doesn't get the same pay?" "The highest performers get bigger raises?" "People only want to team up with the best workers?"

They are in for a shock.

[NYC_SKP]

111. Or, we could encourage them that they can make their OWN world and don't have to put up

with bullying and bullshit and favorites.

We could do that instead of "preparing them for the real world".

What a concept.

.................................................................

[FLPanhandle]

115. Their "own" fantasy world maybe.

In the real world, the best performers ARE going to get the most pay. The worst performers will be avoided. The one with the best social skills will be the most popular.

You would have them believe in a fantasy world where social skills, work skills, athletic skills aren't important to work on. They are important.

School is as much about learning social skills and how to make friends as much as it is topics, otherwise just home school the little darlings so they don't ever meet another child and have to interact or risk getting their feelings hurt.

[NYC_SKP]

116. Nope. Artificial bully games at recess and who is the best "athlete" is what's artificial.

During that same recess period, we could be encouraging art or music or theater or any number of other VERY social activities to develop work and social skills.

Sorry, I happen to think that sports and picking captains and teams is only the tiniest sliver of education, and one we could do well without.

[FLPanhandle]

117. There are art and music classes already for that.

God forbid the kids get a chance to actually move around, play, sweat, and compete because you don't like sports.

[NYC_SKP]

118. Dance, gymnastics, lots of things to do for appropriate physical education. nt

[FLPanhandle]

119. So? Running, tennis, baseball, football are also appropriate physical education

You don't like sports and you don't want kids to do them. I get it. I don't agree with it, but fine.

[NYC_SKP]

123. Please refer to the OP topic. Choosing teams. Not all sports are team sports. eom.

[FLPanhandle]

124. So it's only team sports you oppose?

And in referring to the OP, it's not during a PE class, but during recess. You know, that time where kids are supposed to be able to PLAY. Maybe pair up into a couple of teams and do something they enjoy.

You oppose TEAM sports. Got it. Still disagree with you.

[XanaDUer]

234. You're joking, right?

In the real world, whatever that is, many times the best-paid or most-promoted are connected in some way to those who have the ability to spread out the goodies.

:rofl:

[JVS]

113. Yeah, send them to the Ayn Rand school for tots!

God forbid children whose motor skills are still in the process of developing not have it made plain to them how badly their classmates think they suck at sports.

[treestar]

180. LOL, other kids aren't THAT good at rewarding ability

These schoolyard bulling things as the preparation for the real world may show us what's wrong with the real world. And why do the bullies get to do it? How did they get picked for that?

Who got to start picking the team? Why?

[FLPanhandle]

187. Kids pairing up into teams to play during recess does not equal "schoolyard bullying"

Try again without the hyperbole.

[treestar]

238. How does a kid get to be the one to start this?

We had it happen in teacher supervised gym class.

At recess, hell, I didn't even have to participate. I'd do something else rather than let those morons start their popularity contest/domination attempt.

You can bet there's a bully in this somewhere, and that he/she is the one who suggested this. Too bad for any kids weak enough to go along with it.

[FLPanhandle]

243. "Too bad for any kids weak enough to go along with it."

Kids that want to pair up into teams to play during a RECESS are now "weak" according to you?

"You can bet there's a bully in this somewhere, and that he/she is the one who suggested this"? Bullshit. Usually it's the two best players that aren't allowed to be on the same team, or whomever had the idea to play, or other factors. In recess the picking was done so fast in order to play that whoever was last didn't stand around for long anyway.

Based on your posts, I think you have some problems.

[Withywindle]

286. You seem to have some nostalgic idea that this is something that happens spontaneously.

My experience, in elementary school in the 70s, was that nobody played well-organized team sports at real "recess." Some kids played cowboys & Indians, some kids climbed on the monkeybars, some played tag, some played four-square or pickup basketball, etcetera.

The organized team-picking the OP is talking about happened in organized PE classes, where it was mandated that every kid in the class had to play a certain team sport whether they liked it or not, and kids were appointed to pick the teams. That's where the humiliation and alienation came in. In real honest kids' playtime recess, kids had the option of choosing not to play a game they didn't like. In PE classes, that choice was taken away.

[FLPanhandle]

292. But we aren't talking about PE Class, we are talking about Recess

When I was in recess in the 60's we would pair up for kickball or touch football or something all the time.

The issue here is the school won't allow the kids in recess to pair up on their own. They require an adult to do it for them.

[shimmergal]

258. Usually it's the favorites of the

gym teachers who get picked to be team "captains."

Not necessarily bullies, but giving them that much power over other kids' self image can turn a basically good kid into one, if it keeps happening.

[FLPanhandle]

264. Except this is refering to RECESS, not PE class

Its about kids during recess pairing up to play. Not gym class.

[hunter]

114. Sports is bullshit. That's what I learned in school.

Also there are bullies who beat you up and call you "queer bait."

In seventh grade P.E. a couple of guys tried to shove me in a locker and sliced my scalp open. There was blood all over the place but everyone said it was an "accident," even me, because I didn't want to get beat up later for telling the truth.

The school nurse shaved off a silver-dollar sized circle of hair and closed up the wound with a couple of butterfly bandages. They had full time school nurses then who were actually allowed to do stuff...

I'd always get picked last for teams in P.E. because the teacher was supervising. During recess I didn't get picked at all. I got told flat out a few time "Nobody wants you." By high school I was completely outside the sadistic social hierarchy. I hated high school so much I skipped my senior year for college, which was one of the smartest decisions I ever made. I still had problems in college, I've always been socially awkward (now diagnosed as Asperger's) but nobody physically assaulted me. I played some co-ed recreational sports and it was actually fun.

If it's "political correctness" to ban "picking teams" I'm all for it. My kids' schools were much kinder, gentler places. I wouldn't wish my own school experiences on anyone.

[distantearlywarning]

120. I was a fairly gifted athlete in middle school (and still am, for an amateur)

Good pitcher when we played softball, successfully ran long-distance track, school champion at tennis & badminton 3 years in a row, set the school record for sit-ups in a minute one year.

Guess who always got picked near last for teams, EVERY SINGLE TIME? That's right - me. That's because the little snotty clique-ish brats who ran my junior high school used every "picking teams" occasion as an excuse to enforce the social pecking order. It never had anything whatsoever to do with athletic ability.

In fact, it never even had anything to do with social ability either. The mean girls all grew up together from kindergarten in a small town, and I was a relative new kid. Somehow, magically, my social abilities grew exponentially when I changed schools again and ended up in a place with a little less conformity - I was suddenly fairly popular all the way through high school when there were no more snotty, bratty girls torturing me every day. Imagine that! I'm sure it couldn't have anything to do with a change in environment. It must have been that I magically developed social acuity overnight or something, because we all know that the only reason anyone ever gets bullied is because something is wrong with THEM, right??? :eyes:

And here's the kicker: I'm also very academically inclined, and until the point where I entered grad school, I was forced every year of my school life to work on "group projects" with lazy losers who couldn't keep up with me intellectually - usually the hard-core jocks in the class. I was never once allowed to fucking "pick my team" academically, and had to carry their pathetic asses through every project without ever being allowed to treat them like I saw them treat the athletically un-gifted on the sports court. Just once I would have loved to stand up in front of the class and pick all the intellectual dim bulbs last, or say in front of everybody, "OMG! Do I really have to work with HER on this project?". Fair is fair, right? I mean, if we think it's that important to expose kids to a little adversity when they're young to toughen them up, or give them a little impetus to improve themselves so they don't get picked last the next time, why not do this in intellectual pursuits too? Why not give the nerds a chance to get their own back in the classroom? I never once saw that happen in school. That's because it's ok in this culture to shit on someone because they can't catch a ball, but not because they're not a mathlete.

[pnwmom]

129. I had a similar experience to yours,

except that it occurred in two different venues during the same time period. At school, I was one of the last picked; in my neighborhood, one of the first. My skills were exactly the same in both places -- it was all to do with popularity.

I also had the same experience with group projects -- being among the one or two to carry the load. Educators want to pretend that this benefits everyone in the group. Right.

[SpartanDem]

122. We're raising a generation over sheltered kids

we're doing kidsa disservice with no one fails, no one gets there feeling hurt, everyone gets trophy mentailty. Elementary and ost of HS wasn't great experience for me ,but now being late 20's I think better person for the adversity. Life is isn't fair and part of growing up is learning suck it grow up pair of boobs or balls delaying that isn't going to help them.

[pnwmom]

130. Reinforcing kids' worst bullying tendencies isn't going to help anyone, either. n/t

[pipi_k]

147. It's easy to say that

when you don't know what else the kids might be dealing with.

Like....at home.

I know it's not the school's responsibility to raise children, but it's also not their job to help kids who might already feel like shit feel even MORE like shit.

I didn't have a happy home life.

I wrote somewhere else that the most hurtful thing my father ever said to me was that I was a "Clumsy, long legged-bitch" because I tripped over his case of beer that was by the back door.

Yeah. OK. I was a piece of shit at home.

Then I go to school and have to stand in increasing humiliation while other kids get picked for team sports and there's just me and two or three others that nobody wants. Because we're worthless.

Six or seven or eight year old kids don't understand much about the world. They just know when people think they're shit.

Some call it "oversheltering".

I call it compassion.

[rufus dog]

125. One of the best Jr. High memories I have is from being picked last

I was a new skinny kid at a school, didn't know anyone, obviously no friends, first class was P.E. and they picked sides for Flag Football. Two captains, one seemed like a good kid, the other came across as a real asshole. Anyway the real asshole snickered at me when he picked the second to last kid before me.

Kickoff and I pull the assholes flag just before the end zone. Of course he is the Quarterback and when he drops back to pass I watch his eyes and drop off the line and when he throws I am between him and the receiver, intercept the pass and go the other way for the touchdown. The kid actually tackles me in the end zone so I pop up and drop the ball on his chest.

The PE coach comes sprinting after us, and I expect him to go off on the kid for tackling me, but he is in my face for dropping the ball on his chest and makes me run for the rest of the class.

Turns out the kid was expected to be the next star at the Jr. High, in two minutes I blew up his confidence. The other captain ended up being the starting QB for the team and personally asked me to come out for the team. Even though I was slow he told the coaches that I would be a great receiver and to put me on the team.

Now I don't do much for the few games I play with the team, catch a few passes, but nothing big, when I was leaving the school I tell the kid how much I appreciate him sticking up for me, he responds that he just didn't want to be made to look like a fool.

So two of us learned a good lesson and an asshole realized he was stinky and smelly. After that I actually relished being picked last.

[sofa king]

210. I have a story just for you.

My seventh grade PE class had a particularly annoying and dangerous bully, who tormented me and several other kids and made our lives miserable for nine months.

One of my friends did pretty well for himself. One day, twenty-five years out of that place, my friend was interviewing prospective employees, when in walked the bully. As the guy was sitting down, my friend cut straight to the chase:

"Do you remember seventh grade gym class?"

"Uh, yes?"

"Then get the fuck out of here."

End of interview. I'm pretty sure my friend is still smiling about it.

[last_texas_dem]

126. Are we talking recess or P. E.?

At least when I was in school (graduated high school in 2001), recess (which we didn't really get to have past third grade) was pretty much a free-for-all with different kids doing different activities. I'm pretty sure any attempt at getting a real team sport game going would have devolved into kids goofing off.

If we're talking P. E., though (as in those hours of torture we non-athletes were forced to be subjected to throughout our school years), I can't blame teachers for moving away from that particular practice. P. E. classes (especially, say, Junior High boys' P. E. classes) are already Lord of the Flies enough as is. What does allowing kids to pick teams accomplish other than constantly reinforcing the social pecking order? I can't really see how forming teams based upon a popularity contest brings about better games than forming them by, say, arbitrarily numbering the kids in the class off "1-2-1-2, etc."

I was generally picked towards the end (I was usually the worst athlete in my class, but usually had four or five kids in the class who were picked after me who were better athletes but lower in the social pecking order- since picking teams had more to do with constantly reinforcing that garbage than actually picking people based upon athletic ability.)

I don't really remember the picking of teams ritual in particular affecting me emotionally, though. The whole required P. E. class thing was more of a nuisance than anything- having to get regularly berated by athletes about something I'd screwed up about or that they thought I should have done, etc. I just didn't give a shit. It didn't make me care more or want to improve my abilities- it just gave me a lot of resentment towards jocks, made me care even less than I already did about sports, and caused me to take every alternative to P. E. classes once I was old enough to have such options available. And I managed to never have to take one past seventh grade; I was an office aide in eighth grade and joined the marching band in high school.

[lumberjack_jeff]

127. Okay. Turn it around. What developmental benefit is there in that little ritual? n/t

[TwilightGardener]

131. Good--that's one tradition that needed to die. Having been the last chosen

a number of times.

[Golden Raisin]

132. I'm in my 60's so "picking teams"

in school was a LONG time ago --- we're talking the Eisenhower/Kennedy eras. I'm an adult and have prioritized and moved on with my life, but I still remember the embarrassment, humiliation and pain of being picked last.

[Raine]

133. GOOD, I'll never forget the humiliation I endured because I was ALWAYS

last. I wasn't picked, I was the one that a team was stuck with. I was a nerd and very small for my age, no one wanted me. I can't say it still hurts but I do feel anger about the insensitivity of the whole thing. I hope no child anymore has to endure that kind of humiliation and rejection.

[exboyfil]

135. I wa the last picked as well

I can't say the picking process bothered me so much as the attitude when we actually played. I remember being in 5th grade having a jerk for a captain of my intramural softball team. I was basically the 10th or 11th person so I may get a single at bat during a game, and I was begrudged and criticized about even that even though I did get a few seeing eye singles and probably had a reasonable batting average. The worst part was getting my ice cream for my team's placement, and having that jerk point out I did not deserve it because of the way I played. Real team concept.

When I was first out of college, I played on a church league softball team. We were required to umpire a certain number of games. Now maybe I blew a call - it was a bang bang play in which I called the runner safe. He did beat the throw, but the base may have been blocked. The team in which the call went against berated me the rest of the game, and stayed around to criticize from the stands as I umped the second game. It is the last time that I ever played organized sports at any level. I have seem some of the worst sportsmanship in church team leagues. Exclusionary attitude as well. I asked about a team at my current church a long time ago, and I was told that, because of the desire to win, they were very selective with their roster.

I never emphasized sports with my daughters. If anything they are worse in sports than I was. I try to encourage them to exercise, but I never did much to promote their participation. They did T-ball, soccer, and basketball at a very basic level. My oldest only did track for one semester as a 7th grader, and my youngest has done cross country and track as a 7th grader. Even then she was badgered by a little Napoleon put in charge of her shot putting and discus throwing. I did go to the coach and contrasted the supportive environment I found in cross country versus what I was seeing in track (I did not mention any names). The behavior against my daughter stopped at least (but not towards one of her teammates). My daughter might have finished near last in every cross country race during the season, but she did finish every race. I am very proud of her, and I was able to attend most of her races.

[PassingFair]

256. In high school, my best friend and I were known, collectively, as "The Rest"...

Because when we picked up teams for sports, the "Captains"
would pick everyone else and then say "....and you get The Rest".

It was usually me and Jill.

But that was in high school, and I really didn't give a *uck!

In fact, "The Rest" enjoyed our time in the outfield, smoking
and watching the ball roll by us while the others had fits.

:rofl:

[nadine_mn]

138. I was picked last all the time, it neither made me suicidal or some super athlete

determined to be stronger or better than everyone else.

I grew up in a small town so labels stuck (once the fat kid always the fat kid, etc). I was fat and uncoordinated - and I still am. I hated gym class and recess, I was picked last and teased often.

So, while I have no desire to ever go to a class reunion, I got over it. Now, not every case is the same because not everyone is the same.

But my experiences taught me about failure, something I needed to be prepared for when I hit law school when suddenly I was surrounded by the 'smart kids' instead of being the smart one.

Some classmates never experienced being "the best" until they were adults and that reality kicked their asses hard.

I agree - PE class should not be about popularity - but holy crap did our PE teacher play favorites, and that's when I learned how much adults suck. Recess is a different matter all together, kids need to learn to work things out on their own.

[yardwork]

143. Thank you for your concern.

[ergot]

145. It's now PC to pretend that every human is identical in every way, shape and form.

To do otherwise allows for feewings to be hurt.
bah.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

171. Strawman argument

Some people are better than others at all kinds of things, but there's no reason to humiliate the ones who aren't.

I used to teach foreign languages. Some students were more talented than others, but I NEVER made fun of or humiliated or encouraged the other students to humiliate the students who were struggling. It's just not helpful if your intent is to get the less able students to improve instead of picking on weaker people.

[tombstone blues]

148. "Lowly kids?"

What do you mean by that? I was picked last a lot. I don't think of it as lowly but more like geeky, skinny, uncoodinated...

[tombstone blues]

149. And yes, it should be banished. It happened in gym class actually.

I never knew why the gym teacher just didn't pick the teams herself. Would have saved me years of humiliation.

[seabeyond]

151. both my kids grew up in schools that do it all the time. nothing different here. nt

[catrose]

152. To summarize

The point is not whether life is unfair or whether some people succeed and some people don't or whether people have different abilities. The point is whether schools should officially reinforce the class system. Sort of like whether your parents should beat you because you're smaller because that happens in life. Schools are supposed to be, however often they fail, nurturing, educational institutions (if any institution can be such a thing). It doesn't take a week for any kid to figure out where he or she is on the school's social totem pole. I just don't think the school should reinforce the system, which amounts to approving it.

[seabeyond]

161. i can be empathitic, but also... i say parents. it is a great lesson for parents to give kids

i asked kids about this and we had a little chat, after i posted my answer. i told son, i was always picked up at the top, and i was a girl. he was surprised. i laughed, but i was good at all sports. i could beat the boys. so even with the gender imbalance, it was great for me cause i not only was first to be picked but first as a female. wonderful experience. i also worked ass off and earned it, too.

he told me he was always picked last. it was him adn the asian kids.

of course it was. i knew.

one of the reasons was because he wasnt the kid yelling, pick me if i am your best friend, ect... he stood quietly.

and he could be psych out easily. he would do well, and one missed ball, he was done. not consistent.

we knew this too

but as a parent and recognizing all this, we spent a lot fo time in discussions and efforts and insight. he is 16 and going strong.

a lot has to do with the parent simply doing their job

that being said

if this is abolished from the system, i am on board. there will be other lesson building situations.

[muriel_volestrangler]

153. So, this is 'political' in what way?

Have you taken on board the right wing meme that doing things in a way that avoids bad feelings is 'political'? Are you saying that such a thing disagrees with your politics?

Is this for a competition, in which winning is everything? Or just a pass-time, where taking part really is the purpose? If this is just 'recess', it sounds like the latter.

In which case, what is so important about picking the best possible team, every time? And someone having to take time to do the choosing? I think it'd be quicker just to say "we'll split people up at random - 1st half of the alphabet v. last half today", or day of the month you were born on , or ... Then you can get on with playing the game.

If this is actually for a competition - where you're going to take it seriously, as a 'match', then, fine, pick teams. But that probably means you're selecting from pre-defined groups, and the team is representing that group. That gives people a target to aim for, in getting good enough to be in the team. But the everyday 'who gets picked last' isn't necessary (you're going to have to pick everyone eventuall), and can develop into bullying. I assume you used this method of team selection as a kid; are you saying that it never happened that some people were left till last not because of their ability at the game, but because of perceived popularity? That it never became a way of saying "no-one likes you" to some poor bastard?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

170. Right--I hate it when alleged Democrats advocate Social Darwinism

that the kids who are picked last for the team deserve to be picked last because they're "not working hard enough."

Some of the gym teachers I knew were downright sadistic to the less athletic kids. There was one who would start every outdoor class with a run around the track (nothing wrong with that part of it), but the five kids who came in last would be forced to DUCK WALK around the track. The teacher could have taken the slower kids aside and said, "Run 1/4 of the way around the track this week and walk the rest. Then run 1/2 of the way next week. Run 3/4 of the way the week after that, and by this time next month, you'll be running all the way."

But no, he had to add HUMILIATION (not to mention the possibility of knee injuries) to the kids' embarrassment at coming in last.

[muriel_volestrangler]

176. Wow - that guy should have been sacked

You're right - that is actually sadistic.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

181. And for more reasons than that

He, uh, took advantage of his proximity to early adolescent girls. It was years before he got what he deserved.

[Name removed]

155. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[winston65]

159. I never had to worry about it

I was in no way a 'sports' kid. Never played baseball,football(the state religion in Texas). When I was in grade school recess was not structured. My fellow dweeb and I were left alone to walk the play ground and talk to each other. The teacher did humiliate me once when he tried to organize a baseball game with the boys in class. I committed an error and he asks me 'don't you know how to play baseball?. I just looked at him and said 'no'. He never bothered me after that. Some kids don't want to play sports, just leave 'em alone. They are already coping with being excluded, don't make it worse with embarrassment.

[WinkyDink]

204. "I never had to worry about it." "The teacher did humiliate me once...."

[Quantess]

160. I had zero interest in competetive sports, and yet I was forced to participate.

I got more a lot exercise running around the track, than standing around the stupid softball outfield, hiding from the ball. PE was the bane of my existence, because I thought sports were boring and unmotivating and trivial. I got yelled at by the other kids because I didn't put effort into it. I didn't want to play, but I had to, and I got yelled at for it. Why should I HAVE to play some stupid, boring sport? You want me to exercise, great, I'll exercise! I opted to run around the track every chance I got, instead of playing the game of the day in PE. I could have been a decent team player, but I just didn't want to. I was usually one of the last to be picked because I just wasn't competetive. In my opinion, nobody should be forced to compete in a sport, as long as they get their exercise some other way.

But...if this is recess we're talking about, then it doesn't seem so horrible for the kids to choose their own teams. Nobody is being forced to play.

[wickerwoman]

223. +1. Baseball/softball is a ridiculous requirement for "physical education".

I think it should always be optional.

The four or five kids who actually give a crap take all the positions where there is the remotest chance they'll have to do any physical exercise and all the other kids sit on a bench or way out in the outfield all day doing nothing.

I remember getting shouted at in fourth grade because you're supposed to touch the base or tag the runner or something. Who knows. Its not like they actually explained the rules to us before we started playing.

Total waste of time. I'd love to see a cost analysis run of the number of dollars spent "teaching" me how to play baseball- something I don't even watch let alone play in my adult life.

And I agree with the poster who pointed out that academic high-flyers never get to pick teams on projects but are always assigned so that they can "help" the jocks by doing all the work themselves. Totally my experience as well. I would definitely trade being picked last at softball if it meant I got to pick my own team on group projects.

[ldf]

175. i turned 60 on wednesday

and my face still burns from embarrassment and humiliation, when i remember that times that i was always the last person picked for any sport.

if you have never experienced that, then you have no clue what that can do to a person. it was a MAJOR source of lack of self confidence that i felt, and feel, even to this day.

yet you call it "politically correctness" gone out of control.

[greenbird]

177. I never got picked.

Ever.

It hurt. Lots of things hurt. Looking back, I can see that that pain was as useful, instructional, and educational as any "self-esteem-promoting" bullshit that my kids have been subjected to. I know that their painful experiences - their reactions to them and my inability to protect them - were more powerful and character-building than any program, policy, or trend.

[noamnety]

183. Imagine if this was done in academic classrooms

Picture a teacher assigning the class into two groups for a big assignment each week. Would it be okay for the teacher to always start with the smartest kids, you here, you there, you here, you there, and at the end, announce "you are the last one because you are the stupidest! That team gets stuck with you!"

If that would be wrong because it's damaging for the child, would be it better for the child in some way if the teacher delegated that job to students?

It's great to say that being told you're incompetent is a great motivator, and I'm sure for some individuals it is. But for MOST children, research supports that it reinforces the idea that they are incompetent and becomes a motivator simply for avoidance, and in some cases avoidance of school altogether. "Stereotype threat" and "learned helplessness" are related phenomenons. It's remarkably easy to train even a very intelligent person to believe they are incapable of doing specific tasks.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotype_threat
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_helplessness

[CreekDog]

189. Why do you have a fetish for doing things the old way --this is not sacrosanct

the way you pick teams is not sign of anything, but times do change.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

190. Nobody gave a GOOD GODDAMN about my self-esteem.

I was chronically depressed from the time I hit junior high (Sixth grade - I was ten years old) all the way through college.

I am a small person with small bones. I am coordinated and can hit a softball. However, I got picked on by the big girls. They would hit me in the head with basketballs when the teacher was not looking. They were six feet tall, probably two hundred pounds. I am five foot three, and back then I weighed 115. Then they would offer to meet me behind the furniture store after school so they could beat me up. Yeah, suuuure.......

:wtf:


Red Rover was suicidal, because the other kids would dip their hands down and deliberately trip me so that I fell flat on my face - HARD - and got the wind knocked out of me.

They said I didn't run fast enough. They wanted me to hit the ball and "let someone else run the bases". I thought that was a bunch of crap.

One day the gum-chewing witch that was the team captain got mad at me because I sat down in left field. It was 100 degree heat, and I did not want to catch any balls. i sat down and she told me I couldn't play anymore. I said, "Good, I don't want to play this stupid game anyway!". Pissed her off but I didn't care. In volleyball, when I served, my arm turned red and throbbed and hurt. They had too many kids on the team anyway (8 instead of 6).

I refused to catch a ball, because I was scared of jamming a finger or breaking a finger. I was in orchestra and I only cared about classical music. I was glad they threw me out of the softball game.

When I was a senior I got a doctor's note to get out of P.E., so I could take typing, something USEFUL to me. Mom said the principal was SHOCKED that somebody would get an excuse to get out of P.E. and take a course that was useful.

Then in orchestra, when we played for chairs every six weeks, I never got above fifth chair in the first violins. The teacher's daughter was always first or second chair, and she was not that talented. There were four kids who were the anointed ones who all rotated between the first two stands. So after we played for chairs, since I never got above fifth chair, I would sit there and cry. I didn't want sympathy, I just didn't give a damn what they thought about my crying.

Later, I got to the point where I would cry at work, and I didn't give a damn what they thought of me then, either.

I learned from P.E. and orchestra that life isn't fair. It's all about who's your daddy, when your daddy is the orchestra director, or it's about who you know. Merit and intelligence don't count for anything. Somebody will hold you back, or fire you, or tell lies about you if you are competent and intelligent.

I found that out when I was a court reporter and the state board wouldn't take my B.A. in Biology and my J.D. for continuing ed credit. They could not understand how a biology degree and a law degree would make me a better court reporter. I can't think of two degrees that would be any better. I told the state board they were not really interested in court reporters getting a good education, let alone a law degree, because they were supposed to be glorified secretaries. I told them that since they were into mediocrity, I was going to let my state license lapse, gladly, and that they were full of chickenshit.

[WinkyDink]

205. {{MoL}} Heh---I DID dislocate my ring finger in college, catching a basketball! I was always a

"good" athlete, not really very good, but enough not to be chosen last. I did throw a mean and accurate dodge-ball. Later, I coached girls' b-ball, but not very well.

But I am a Democrat, without exaggeration, because my mother advised me early on to put myself in another's shoes.

And that is what the OP is not doing.

[defendandprotect]

196. King of the Hill only serves the interests of the few --

personal competition doesn't really serve a community --

cooperation enriches all of us --

[bluestateguy]

206. I will say this

It is probably not a good idea for a P.E. teacher to facilitate class in this way (picking teams), but at recess or out on the sandlots away from school, the kids should have some lattitude to make the rules for team selection.

[Lucian]

212. God I hope not.

This whole culture of not wanting to hurt a kid's self esteem has turned them into whiny kids who want everything handed to them because they *gasp* think they deserve it!

:eyes:

[Manifestor_of_Light]

213. Why do they commit suicide then? High self esteem?

Some kids do commit suicide and get extremely depressed. This thread has shown that.

[Lucian]

215. Obviously there's exceptions to everything.

"But what about..."

Always.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

217. There's a difference between being overly gentle with a child's feelings and

what we're talking about here, which is the teachers reinforcing the students' social hierarchy and prejudices instead of helping the less able students improve.

Faced with a student who is doing poorly in sports or academics or anything, which is more effective:

1. Telling the student that s/he is a hopeless klutz/stupid and reinforcing the other students' tendency to ridicule that student

or

2. Telling the student that even though s/he may be struggling now, here are the ways in which s/he can improve.

Which is more effective?

From the personal testimonies here, the most common effect of publicly humiliating the physically unfit kids is to create an aversion to all physical activity. Is that what PE teachers really want?

[Manifestor_of_Light]

260. I was COORDINATED but not big.

I was coordinated and could hit a softball. The problem was that I was not six feet tall. You had to be six feet tall (as a girl) to be good enough to be picked.

I was a good hitter, but I was small, so I didn't run fast enough to suit them. It's not even about being a klutz, necessarily, it's about being BIG AND STUPID to play well.

As I said, I sat down in left field in 100 degree heat, and got ejected from the game, to which i said, "GOOD!!" :D

I hate team sports. Always have. High school P.E. just reinforced that. It applied with the girls too. Big girls, six feet tall, stupid, prejudiced, and good athletes were the ones the teachers liked.


:banghead:

[rpannier]

225. The OP is about recess

Recess is free time where children are allowed to engage in whatever activity interests them at that moment:
The swings and slide, soccer, etc.
The kids playing soccer or football are there by choice.

[Le Taz Hot]

226. I hope so!

As an asthmatic I was ALWAYS picked last I was puny for my age, not healthy and definitely not athletic. The last-picked person is thoroughly humiliated in front of the whole class. The team who gets "stuck with you-know-who" (a term I've heard more than I care to remember) resents the fact that you've been thrust on them and will treat you accordingly. No, my friend, this is MUCH MUCH more than "political correctness."

[alphafemale]

232. Anything was better than when they taught us Square Dancing

Gawd, How I hated that shit.

[Codeine]

235. My worst grade school memories involve square dancing lessons in the gym.

Easily the most ridiculous thing I've ever been forced to do.

[alphafemale]

248. I despised that with a fiery passion

Dosey Doe this!

[NuttyFluffers]

237. i liked the square dancing. it was sorta fun.

hmm, maybe because i like dancing and the socializing that went with it. i was sad that when i moved my other schools didn't teach much dance, let alone a square dance. a half-hearted attempt at waltz by 8th grade, but otherwise never again. :(

[alphafemale]

249. At least learning to fucking Waltz might prove useful later in your fuckin life.

Like at a wedding or something.

I really doubt in my life someones going to pull out a Moonshine Jug and Washboard and start calling out a Promenade.

I knew it was useless...those stupid, insipid skippy...skipppy steps.


AAAARRRRGGHHH!!!!

[lolly]

281. Many older adults square dance regularly

Fulfilling the purported goal of PE, which I always heard was supposed to be "instilling lifelong habits of physical fitness."

I'm guessing that more 50+ Americans square dance than play football.

Which is not to say that you should be forced to do it if you would rather play football.

Right?

[pipi_k]

261. There was a failed attempt in 10th or 11th grade

by the girls' gym teachers to try to refine us with some kind of modified ballet moves.

You know...the graceful hand movements, etc.

Poor teachers (there were two of them). We were just too clumsy and awkward. They got very frustrated and gave up on us.


I liked when we did candlepin bowling once a week. Oh, then in our Senior year they (for some strange reason) had to teach us Drivers Ed. One day we got to walk up to the corner and watch cars going by (very busy downtown street).

And this was a Business oriented High School...go figure....

I never did learn to use the mimeograph machine with style and grace, but I could score with the best at the Friday afternoon office empty toner bottle bowling contests...

:7

[pipi_k]

240. I loved it, but...

it was bittersweet.

Because, as I stated above, the other kids made a big deal out of not wanting to touch my hands due to coldness and sweating from Raynauds.

[alphafemale]

251. OK

[FLPanhandle]

244. Argh! Flashback! Square dancing in elementary school!

That was awful for us too.

[alphafemale]

250. I know...right?

:rofl:

[Odin2005]

246. Grapevine!

[alphafemale]

252. shudder!

[Blue-Jay]

263. That's nothing. I had to learn to dance "The Hustle" in gym class.

Just imagine it: A gold chain-wearing PE teacher, teaching 7 year-olds how to disco dance, when we just wanted to play dodgeball, shoot baskets, or have a dangerous game of Red Rover. Oh, how I hated those cold/rainy "indoor PE days" days.

On the positive side, I still remember how to dance "The Hustle".


On topic, stupid Donnie Underwood was always picked first for Red Rover. He was a freak of nature - arms like iron pipes - an immovable object. I foolishly tried to run through Donnie and Todd McCracken's interlocked arms one day, and it was like running full-speed into a brick wall.

[pipi_k]

267. I'm jealous!!!!!

I was in my prime when Disco came out. Never did learn a lot of those dances...just sort of winged it.

Oh, and I was always envious of people who could do "The Electric Slide" in the 80s - 90s, too...


:7

[XanaDUer]

233. Good

And standing there watching the last kids picked was excruciating. I was not a top pick, except in kickball, b/c I could kick that sucker outta the playground, but I hated that picking-teams crap.

I hope they stop it. Kids can grow up and be humiliated and tortured at work when they join the American rat race.

[NuttyFluffers]

236. meh, sounds cool, but whatev. as long as team captains rotate, other system is fine at recess.

i was picked last all the time, but then i never liked sports (like ALL of them) and refused to play them during recess. only during PE did we have team captains and choosing teams.

there was one funny time i was chosen as team captain (i think it was curiosity/humor on the PE coach's part) in PE -- for creating multiple 5 player teams -- i so soundly beat the JV quarterback's teams that it was a straight shut out for weeks. i picked a better roster and structured the teams in a way that i was assured to win at least all but one of the team contests. JV QB created the sub-team he was in with all his highly athletic buddies and left the rest of the sub-teams to fend for themselves. i assigned myself as one of the lowest tier players and delegated sub-captains to manage my more well rounded teams during play. and even then his "all-star" team would get beat once in a while by a sub-team of mine. this daily loss at PE by the least athletic person was perhaps too much for the JV QB i guess, because after 2 1/2 weeks of this there must have been backroom whining that later changed the sport to one more amenable to his players. even so, with a reorganization i made teams relatively equal to his and then walked away from any further effort. i even routinely asked my sub-captain to sit me out so i could avoid being all sweaty for my next class. i really could not care less about PE. and i think something about me out-organizing the coach and JV QB, still being completely unmotivated to lead further, and winning handily each match-up killed a little bit of their joy inside. whatever, PE was still stupid and boring, and i got to avoid sweating for a bad cause for a bit.

now that i remember childhood, i soon after actually started to enjoy being picked last. lowered expectations, more chance to pick dandelions before the miserable game started, and often excused to backbench or play way outfield. forced team sports suck ass and anything that delayed being a part of it was a mercy. to this day i am thankful being picked last for building a level of secure self-esteem so that i am mostly unafraid to do pretty much anything different from "normalcy." being a part of that sort of childhood normalcy never made me happy, so why bother moving to a tune you hate? it's been a lesson which has been very useful later on in life.

[WatsonT]

241. Time to start learning Mandarin

[Odin2005]

245. Good, letting kids picking their own teems is a subtle for of bullying.

It's all about the popular kids humiliating the unpopular ones.

[Cleita]

253. I agree. Teams should be selected by lottery. Each

captain needs to work with the players he got. It's known as democracy and is a good social tool to teach children.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

268. kick

[bbdad]

271. Hey, buddy, how about genuine fitness classes ...

... for nonathletic kids instead of cramming sports down the throats of kids who aren't even interested in them? Stop using a "one size fits all" approach towards kids' physical fitness needs.

[Matariki]

272. It's not "political correctness out of control" to ban that shitty practice.

It always seemed like a cruel social engineering experiment to me.

[madville]

273. Yep, and everyone gets a trophy and they don't keep score at the baseball game

I got looked at like I was nuts when I asked what the score was at the rec park recently. I guess for the younger kids they don't keep score so no one has to lose. My kids are teenagers now, they have been taught to want to WIN, not just participate, they get pissed when they or their team is on the losing end, it just seems like right with the natural competitive nature humans have.

[TransitJohn]

278. And reality inches closer to Harrison Bergeron eom

n/t

[Withywindle]

282. If so, good.

I'm usually horrified by the wussification of school kids, but this is one tradition I remember from my childhood that I would weep no tears for.


I was always picked last, because I have a slight birth defect that messes with my balance (not to the level of a disability, and certainly something no child would want attention called to). It never inspired me to "try harder." It inspired me to deliberately play so badly that I sabotaged the team of the kid who rolled his eyes when he got stuck with me, because the concept of "winning" held no meaning to me at all, I just wanted to piss that little jerk off.

Questioning authority and passive resistance started with the "team captain" and the gym teachers, in my case. Sports rules were pretty much the first rules that I looked upon as objectively moronic--and so that's what set me on my path as a lefty troublemaker.

[Vinca]

293. I am 62 years old and I still remember how I felt being the last one picked for kickball.

All the time. It ruined my memories of elementary school.

[Prometheus Bound]

295. I was good at sports so I was always a captain.

But I remember feeling uncomfortable picking the teams.

I wanted to win, so I had to pick the best I could get, but I hated the look of resignation on the faces of those who were last every day. It's a shitty system. Better for one person to try to make as even a contest as possible without letting it be known who was first and last choice.

I agree with banning this practice.