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What is 'Wellness'?
Wellness
is the positive component of optimal health*. There are several
dimensions that constitute overall wellness - emotional, intellectual,
social, spiritual, and physical. The
key to understanding wellness is the integration of these
dimensions.
The
purpose of this column is to broaden the charge of physical education
graduates to include wellness teaching. Physical wellness is strongly
associated with positive outcomes across other dimensions. Therefore,
not only is the teaching of sports skills and lifetime activity
important - but the promotion of student intellectual and social
wellness through physical activity should become a necessary objective
for physical education teachers.
Graduates
of physical education programs possess knowledge of human movement,
fitness, and health behaviors that can assist children toward achieving
wellness. Because the dimensions of wellness are integrated (improved
fitness results in improved emotional, intellectual and social outcomes),
the influence of physical education teaching on student attitudes
and behaviors results in improvements beyond those of health-related
fitness. Physical education teacher education programs must underscore
for future teachers the understanding that 'overall wellness' is
a worthy and realistic goal for the children they will teach; the
influence of a physical education teacher is not limited to the
mere 'physical' outcomes of doing physical activity.
Darren Dale
Health and Fitness Section Editor
*Reference: Corbin, C.B. & Lindsey, R. (1997).
Concepts of Physical Fitness With Laboratories. Brown and Benchmark
Publishers, Dubuque, IA. |
| Information Guidelines Released |
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Activity Guidelines for Children Under 5yrs
The recent release of NASPE guidelines for infants and toddlers
is welcome news. Already, the recommendations have received wide
exposure, (e.g., Newsday,
and Babycenter.com
-scroll down page)- and this is encouraging in the context of reaching
as many any parents and early childhood teachers as possible.
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Heredity and health-related fitness
Among researchers, Claude Bouchard is well-known
for his work on heredity and health related fitness. Fitness professionals
– school teachers, personal trainers, sports coaches – should be
award of Bouchard’s contribution to our understanding of how people
respond to exercise. I refer readers to an informative and highly
readable article
that appeared in an early issue of the Research Digest of the President’s
Council on Physical Fitness and Sports. In this issue, the editors
of this digest preface Bouchard’s comments with the following:
"Bouchard and his colleagues have been
the pioneers who have demonstrated that not only do people differ
in fitness based on heredity, but people of different genetic backgrounds
respond differently to training".
Below, information for fitness professionals
is given summarizing why it is important to know how heredity affects
the response of different individuals to training programs designed
to decrease body fat or improve muscular strength. Aerobic fitness
will be covered in a later column.
Body
composition: Fitness professionals cannot assume that all clients
who are diligent with respect to their exercise programs and diet
will obtain the outcome of a slim and slender body shape. Setting
realistic goals, on an individual basis, is the right thing to do.
Goals that are unrealistic may turn out to be detrimental to exercise
adherence; people will not continue with the same behaviors if they
believe goals are unattainable. Fitness professionals should encourage
health behaviors –and let the outcomes (level and distribution of
body fat) take care of themselves.
Furthermore, fitness professionals who are have a clear understanding
of the genetic contribution to an individual’s body composition
(30-60% variance in subcutaneous fat distribution explained by genetics)
should be less likely to assume that a heavier person is sedentary,
a poor eater, or simply lazy.
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| If you have ideas, comments, letters to share, or questions
about particular topics, please email one of the following Health
and Fitness Section Editors: |
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Questions to Ask, or
Thoughts to Share?
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The number of overweight and obese children
Although there is agreement
on the trend toward a greater number of American children becoming
heavier and heavier as the years go by, specific (accurate) numbers
remain elusive for many people. Are 2 out of every 10 children overweight...
or instead, fat enough to put their health at risk? Or is it 5 out
of every 10 children who are overweight... or, obese? How
is the distinction made between overweight and obese? The answer
to such questions can be found in a recent column
by John Allen Paulos (author of "A Mathematician Reads the
Newspaper). Among other things, Paulos explains how 20% of minority
children and 12% of white children can be classified as being above
the 95th percentile according to the body mass index - numbers
that on the surface, are mathematically impossible.
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