Every day our young learners are having recess revoked as punishment or as catch up time academically instead of having their chance to free play at recess. It has been shown that children perform better in schools if they have unstructured play or breaks during the school day. Lunch is not a break. PE is not a substitute for recess nor is PE granted everyday to our elementary students.

Some days students are sitting, working, on academics for the entire day. This can cause mental and psychological strain, academic stress, and frustration. I’m asking that the schools provide 30 minutes of recess everyday prohibiting the teachers or individual schools to use recess as a reward or the lack of punishment or as catch up time.

Recess is the child’s time and every child deserves to enjoy their short amount of free time during break in the academic schedule.