Olympic Week in schools: giving a taste for physical activity to combat a worrying sedentary lifestyle

Le break dance s'est aussi invité auprès des jeunes lors de cette semaine olympique, comme ici à Arras. MAXPPP – Ludovic Maillard

Until April 8, activities and initiations around sport are increasing in schools. To promote Olympic values ​​but also to restore the taste for effort to increasingly sedentary young people.

The figures are shocking. According to a study financed by the Ministry of Sports and unveiled in early 2023, less than 25% of 6-17 year olds in France reach the physical activity threshold recommended by the WHO. running tests highlight a loss of speed of 1 km/h in 35 years among 10-12 year olds, concluding that an active 65 year old subject would be more efficient than many adolescents . A galloping sedentary lifestyle against a backdrop of overuse of screens.

"We see children arriving in 6th grade who have never run"

"We see children arriving in 6th grade who have clearly never run. At this age they are still malleable but we really need to drive the point home in 6th grade", explains Lozerian Brigitte Guibal, ex-Olympic medalist in Canoe-Kayak, PE teacher at Low wall.

Also read: "Childhood obesity is not visible" : diet, screens, sedentary lifestyle… the alert of two specialists

"It's true, we feel the harm of this sedentary lifestyle", recognizes Marion Buisson-Levicq. The former high-level pole vaulter, PE teacher at the Jeu de mail college in Montpellier, however, believes that "the driving forces to encourage a kid to pursue an activity physical are desire and pleasure. Festive events like this Olympic week inevitably contribute to this. But there is a small contradiction between the dream that we bring to them and the real means that we are given over the year for sports practice."

Generalize the 30 minutes of daily activity in primary school

Allusion to a lack of lesson hours denounced on March 15 by Snep-FSU, the profession's union, on the insufficient number of hours of sports lessons in France (4’ nbsp;weekly hours in 6th grade, 3 hours from 5th to 3rd grade, 2 hours in high school).

For Sophie Béjean, rector of the Greater Academic Region and the Montpellier Academy, "the "Generation 2024" of 352 establishments of the academy, of which 255 of the first degree demonstrate the desire to move around the dynamics of the Olympic Games with a huge number of projects and initiatives, including on the discovery of Paralympic sports.&quot ;

Sports sections for 3,200 academy students

The rector also recalls the generalization of the system "30 minutes of daily activities" in primary, launched at the start of the 2022 school year, "which we are in the process of generalizing and which is taken up in some colleges in Gard."

Another measure launched during the 2022-2023 school year, "the possibility for middle school students to practice two more hours per week in gaps in their schedule, in partnership with sports clubs."

The unions are demanding 4 hours of lessons per week for all

Sophie Béjean also recalls the perpetuation of the challenge "Live, move !" in partnership with the Montpellier Cancer Institute, "which encourages students and their loved ones to move with family or at school". The 2024 edition, which ended on April 7, mobilized 23,000 schoolchildren.

The rector finally announces that the ministry is encouraging the creation of sports sections, which concern 130 sectors and 3,200 students in the academy. However, the Snes-FSU maintains its demand for "4 hours of PE per week at school for all children and not no 30 minutes of daily physical activity or even 2 hours of sport in addition for around twenty students per college".

Patrice Canayer: "Sport does not have its place in school"

Will the 2024 Games be enough to change minds and practices? Not sure. Former PE teacher, manager and coach of Montpellier Handball, Patrice Canayer recently admitted his disappointment on this point: "Sport does not have all its place at school in France. We had the hope of a great dynamic around the Games, a hope of a former PE teacher about to be disappointed…"

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