Elementary schools are banning recess games? Talk about hampering the childhood obesity fight!

At first I thought this was a joke when I read it, but apparently not.

Citing fear that students will get hurt and sue, Willett Elementary School south of Boston has banned tag, touch football, and all other "chase games" from the playground. Elementary schools in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Spokane, Washington, also recently banned tag during recess.

This is over the top. Should schools stop letting kids ride the bus to school for fear they'll get sued if a child will get hurt in an accident? Should schools stop letting kids play football, soccer, basketball and baseball for fear a lawsuit stemming from an injury? Should schools forbid our children from entering contests for fear of getting sued for emotional distress if they don't win? The schools might as well take away all the playground equipment and toys, and put each kid in a fenced in cage during recess to keep them from hurting themselves.

Part of this is our fault as a society for being so sue happy. Some people are willing to sue for anything if they think they can get money out of it. At the same time, if the school was so concerned about getting sued they'd have parents sign recess disclaimers at the beginning of each school year.

Willett Elementary cites that there are plenty of "other activities" the kids can partake in during recess. Sure, I can think of a ton, but almost all of them do not allow the children to get solid exercise from running around. When I was in elementary school, almost all of the exercise we got while at school was at from playing games where we "chased others." Football, basketball, baseball (when running to tag someone with the ball), kickball, rugby, tag, soccer, hide and go seek, capture the flag, running around the track, and red rover would all be banned at Willett Elementary.

On top of not being able to participate in those types of activities, I noticed they only gave the kids 20 minutes during one of their recesses. Twenty minutes? Ridiculous! It sounds to me like we're cutting back on recess to either limit liability for the school, give more time to teach the students to improve standardized test scores (school administrators are judged and sometimes compensated on students' test scores), or combinations of both.

In the end, the ones who are truly being hurt are the children. It seems Americans are so busy tightening the clamps on nutrition at school, that we're overlooking the other half of the equation, exercise.

Childhood obesity is already out of hand and getting worse. Until we scrutinize exercise in the same manner we're beginning to scrutinize nutrition, childhood obesity will only at level off at best, and will not improve any time soon.

For more information on childhood obesity, visit our Childhood Obesity Forum