Fitness Benchmarks

Tomorrow is the first day of testing for my my students. I am going to use these benchmarks from the President's Fitness Challenge and the Fitnessgram "Zones" when comparing my students results.

Trial and Error

I have decided that I am going to hold off on choosing a specific fitness program. Instead, I am going to choose specific activities to test my students on and use the programs I have researched as guidelines. Once I see how that goes, I can further investigate which program I am going to use to track my students progress. For right now, I will give each student and index card to record their results and I will keep them in my office. On Monday, students  in PE class will run the timed mile and perform the pull-up test.. On Tuesday, they will be tested on sit-ups and push-ups, as well as the shuttle run. This takes care of only 1/4 of the school so I will be testing every Friday for this month with a different group of students. The 5th and 6th graders seem really excited for this fitness test, where as only a small handful, of 7th and 8th graders seem excited. The level of excitement makes me want to use the President's Fitness Challenge so that they receive and award or a badge. I could also create my own award to give to them. Has anyone done that before?

President's Challenge Fitness Test

I found this video that shows examples of how each test should be performed. I really like this video because it shows modifications for students that may have difficulty performing the tasks (which is a lot of students). Using modifications in this fitness test will allow for a higher success rate.

President's Challenge vs. Fitnessgram

The President's Challenge consists of five different activities: 
- Curl-ups
- Shuttle run
- Endurance run/walk
- Pull-ups or flexed arm hang or push-ups
- Sit and reach

Fitnessgram consists of many different activities:

- PACER test
- One mule run/walk
- Walk test (age 13+)
- % body fat
- BMI
- Curl-ups
- Trunk Lift
- Pull-ups or flexed arm hang or push-ups
- Sit and reach 

The President's Challenge program provides me with a FREE software to enter my student's data. It also allows me to generate reports of their data. 

Fitnessgram software would cost $414.00 per school year in my school (based on the number of students). The price would increase if we were to do it district-wide. The software allows me to enter my student's data and track it, as well as share it with their parents/guardians. I would be able to print their record sheet or send it via e-mail.