Applying the science of

well-being.

FITNESS & BRAIN RESEARCH GRATITUDE RESEARCH My Account about us school consulting

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?

... as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

- Marianne Williamson

FITNESS & BRAIN RESEARCH

The Positivity Company is dedicated to bringing you research results in brief readable format along with concepts you can use. The affect of exercise on the brain. learning and thinking has applications in education:

Here it is in a nutshell: For school PE programs focus the program on fitness not sports. Here is how:

Focus the teaching on cardiovascular fitness primarily and sports as part of it. Why? watch a group of kids playing a sport, there is a lot of waiting (waiting for your turn at bat, waiting for the ball to come to you, etc.) A focus on cardio fitness means change the games to two-on-two basetball; or soccer with 4 on 4 so the kids are moving all the time.
Use heart monitors; With monitors you can get a base line fitness level for kids and grade them based on their own improvement. A heart monitor can compute the average heart rate over a period of time. Don't grade on how well the student did with two-on-two basketball grade them if their average hart rate was higher today than yesterday.
Have a regularly scheduled measurement for example a weekly one mile run or stationary bike task using the heart rate monitor. Celebrate kids who make a personal best, no matter where they started.
Doing the above will reward kids who are not athletic. Non athletic kids will have a chance to improve as much (maybe more) than the athletes, because you are measuring everyone's fitness level with the heart monitors.

THE RESEARCH in a nutshell: Cardiovascular exercise increases the brain's ability to grow brain cells and make new connections between neurons (in other words improves learning).

Here are the studies:
Many of these studies are in the book SPARK: The revolutionary new science of exercise and the brain by John Ratey with Eric Hagerman (2008, New York: Little, Brown and Company). The book has some great examples, but a problem with it for us at The Positivity Company is the lack of scientific references. We can't track down the specific studies mentioned and tell you about them.