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PLAYTIME. Tacoma Public School students will be getting in more time out on the playground this school year, as the board recently decided to revise the current recess policy for elementary schools. In the future, all elementary schools will have one additional recess time per day.

More free time on horizon for Tacoma kids

By Clare Jensen

Students in Tacoma public elementary schools will soon be getting an extra period of down time in the upcoming school year.

Currently, all elementary classes get at least one 30-minute lunch-recess segment during the six-hour day. An additional recess break has been left up to the discretion of school principals, until now.

At a Tacoma School Board study session July 24, board members agreed that it was their intent for all schools to have an additional recess to the lunch-recess period.

They directed Superintendent Art Jarvis to revise the district’s current recess policy to fit that intent.

Based on a district-conducted survey of more than 400 elementary school teachers, 17 percent stated their students get additional recess every day.

More than half of the teachers indicated their students get no additional recess, and some stated they get an additional recess one day per week.

Jarvis recommended changing the policy to require an additional recess every day at each school. While Jarvis said he “clearly supports best practices in reading and math” he does not support eliminating activity time to achieve higher standards in learning.

“The best way to engage a student is to broaden their day, not narrow it,” he said.

Board member Debbie Winskill said that when the current policy was instated, “it never got translated down to the building level.” She said some buildings and teachers are not aware that they could opt for additional recess time.

Thirty-seven percent of surveyed teachers said they were satisfied with the current recess policy. Forty-three percent of teachers stated they were dissatisfied with the policy.

“Other districts make recess work. I don’t know why we’re having such a tough time with this,” said board member Kim Golding. “It matters to us that kids have recess and get enough recess. It’s not just for activity, it’s for down time, and processing. Kids are going to learn better because they’re not going to be tuning out as much.”

Board member Connie Rickman suggested that in addition to adding more recess time, the term “lunch-recess” should also be dropped.

Students can be notorious for eating food quickly in order to get as much time out on the playground as possible. Having a designated recess time before lunch would deter that behavior.

The new policy would provide one additional recess to the already required lunch-recess daily. It would also give individual schools power to schedule the extra recess at an appropriate time.

The board will hold two public meetings before adoption of the policy.

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