College Teaching Part 19

Health instruction, then, as a part of physical training, draws its content from these sources. A logical plan of cla.s.s instruction would, therefore, include the elements of anatomy, physiology, psychology, bacteriology (and general parasitology), pathology, economics, and sociology, as a basis for a more complete presentation of the facts of general hygiene, individual hygiene, group hygiene, and intergroup hygiene.

=Method of health instruction=

The most satisfactory presentation of these subjects involves the grouping of students into small cla.s.ses, the employment of laboratory methods, the use of reference libraries, and the a.s.signment of problems for investigation and study, with a general group discussion of these problems.

Unfortunately, college cla.s.ses are large and the number of teachers employed in the department of physical training, or in those departments from which physical training draws its science and its philosophy, is small, so that it is impractical to plan to give this instruction to small groups of students covering this range of subject matter.

As a result, the lecture method with its obvious defects and shortcomings is the common medium for the health instruction of college students organized into cla.s.ses. The more intimate and detailed instruction in these subjects is secured in special courses and in professional schools.

In the College of the City of New York, we expect that students who come to us from high schools and preparatory schools have had the elements of anatomy and physiology either in courses on those subjects or in courses in biology.[13] Our health instruction, therefore, has been developed along the lines of lectures on general hygiene, individual hygiene, group hygiene, and intergroup hygiene running through the four terms of the freshman and soph.o.m.ore years.

These lectures are given in periods of from ten to fifteen minutes each, preceding cla.s.s work in various forms of physical exercise. They are often called "floor talks." The shortness of the presentation favors vigor of address; necessitates a concise organization of material and a clarity and brevity of statement; and is more likely to command student attention and concentration. It has, however, its obvious defects. In these lectures persistent effort is made to influence the daily habits of the student. The lecture content is selected with reference to the practical problems of the daily life of the individual and of the community of which he is a part. It is obvious that the amount of time devoted to the presentation of the subject matter is utterly inadequate.

Short written tests are given once each month, and a longer written test is given at the end of each term. These examinations stimulate the student to organize his information and make it more completely his own property. The cla.s.ses are too large[14] and the instructional force relatively too small to permit the a.s.signment of references, presentation of reports, and the conduct of investigations.

Further instruction in physiology and bacteriology is secured in this inst.i.tution through elective courses open to students in their junior and senior years. These elective courses, however, are not planned primarily for the health education of the student, but rather for his partial preparation as a teacher of physical training, a student of medicine, a scientific specialist, or for public health work.

HEALTH-FORMING ACTIVITIES OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION

The third division of activities contains the health-habit-forming influences covered by the Department of Physical Training. These influences are formed partly in connection with the follow-up activities a.s.sociated with the health examinations and advice noted above; partly through impressions made by way of individual and cla.s.s instruction concerning the laws of health (also noted above); and partly through systematic cla.s.s work, group work, and individual work in gymnastics, organized recreation, games, play, and athletics.

The student who has been given a health examination each term throughout his college career will be very likely to continue the practice as a habit after graduation. This habit will follow more surely if the examiner has been a real health teacher and not a perfunctory recorder of observations made upon the student. A lack of sympathy and tact may easily prejudice the student against the examination.

The student who has been led regularly to care for defects of one sort or another; whose contact with his examiner-teacher in conferences following up the advice that has been given at the time of examination has been accompanied by the right sort of explanation and mutual understanding, will be more likely to continue to exercise that sort of care for the welfare of his body after he is no longer under the influence of the college.

The student who has seen the application of cla.s.s health talks to his everyday problems is likely to be influenced to the practice of consequent health habits, particularly if those short lectures serve to correlate his various habit-forming experiences while in college.

And finally, the student who is brought into contact with regular systematic exercise may, if the exercise is attractive and interesting, achieve a health habit that will be carried out into his postgraduate life.

The existence of the Department of Physical Training would be amply justified if its influence upon the health and vigor of the student were limited to the period of his stay in college. The full success of this department, however, like that of all other college departments, must be measured by its influence upon the life of the student after he has left college. The formation of lasting health habits is, therefore, the most important object of this department.

=Place of physical exercise in program for physical education=

Regular appropriate physical exercise is one of our most important health habits. It is perhaps safe to say that for the average individual it is the most important health habit. This is true because of its intimate and impressive influence upon all the fundamental organic functions of the body. Physical exercise in the American college is provided either as organized cla.s.s work in the gymnasium, or by means of voluntary recreational opportunities, or through athletics.

=Cla.s.s work in physical exercise=

Cla.s.s work may include: marching, ma.s.s drills with or without light apparatus, work on heavy apparatus, games, dancing, swimming, and track and field work. This cla.s.s work may be indoors or outdoors, depending on the season or climate.

=Additional facilities for physical exercise=

Voluntary recreational opportunities are offered through free ma.s.s drills open to all students who may desire to take them regularly or irregularly; through open periods for apparatus work; and through facilities and s.p.a.ce for games, swimming, ma.s.s athletics, and so on.

=Recreational activities and athletics=

Compet.i.tive athletics are typical of the American college.

Theoretically, athletics are open to all students. Practically, in many of our colleges athletics are made available only to the student with leisure time and exceptional physique. Consistent effort is being made today by college authorities to provide opportunities for intramural (intercla.s.s, intergroup, and ma.s.s) athletics for the whole student body; at the same time preserving the desirable features of the more specialized intercollegiate compet.i.tions.

=Inculcating habits of physical exercise=

Physical exercise in these various forms has its immediate and valuable influence upon the health condition of the individual student, if taken in sufficient quant.i.ty. It has its lasting and very much more important influence in those cases in which physical exercise becomes a habit. It has, therefore, become the increasing concern of the college teacher of physical training to develop activities in physical exercise that the student may use after graduation. Teachers of physical training have become more and more impressed with the importance of interesting exercise, not only because interesting exercise is more likely to become habitual exercise, but also because exercise that is accompanied by the play spirit, by happiness and joy, is physiologically and therefore healthfully of very much more value to the individual. The relationship between cheerfulness and good health has become very firmly established through the scientific researches of the modern physiologist. We know that health habits which are a.s.sociated with cheerfulness and happiness are bound to be more effective.

=Opportunities for character building=

The teacher of physical training finds opportunity for incidental and yet very important instruction leading to the formation of fine qualities of character and fine standards of personal conduct. These opportunities arise constantly in the various general types of physical exercise found in the curriculum of the department of physical training. They are especially present in those activities in which compet.i.tion occurs, as in play, games, and athletics. These activities do not in themselves produce excellent qualities of character or high standards of conduct, but the teacher--whether he be called a coach or a trainer or a professor of hygiene--who sets a good example and who insists that every game played, and every contest, whether it be in a handball court between college chums or on the football field between college teams, shall be clean and fair, is using in the right way one of the opportunities present in the entire college life of the student, for the formation of fine character.

SPECIAL EXERCISES FOR SPECIAL GROUPS

In any given group of college students one will find a number of individuals in need of special or modified physical exercise. These students may be grouped commonly under the following heads: (1) undeveloped, (2) bad posture, (3) awkward, (4) originally weak, (5) deformed.

Some of these students suffer from defects that are remediable, Some of these defects are due to poor physical training in earlier years.

Some are the results of disease. All of them call for modified exercise and recreation. The fact that a student may fall into one of these groups in no way justifies the a.s.sumption that he is therefore no longer subject to the laws of health or to the need for rational health habits. As a matter of fact, such cases generally call for greater care and attention in the formulation and operation of a rational policy of right living.

Every student physically able to go to college is physically able to exercise. No student in attendance on recitations anywhere can offer a rational plea for exemption from exercise, The individual whose physical condition contraindicates all forms of exercise needs careful medical advice and probably needs hospital or sanitarium treatment.

College Departments of Physical Training are planning for cases in need of special or modified exercise, through the organization of special cla.s.ses and through individual attention. In the College of the City of New York we attempt to group the weak students in a given cla.s.s, into squads of four such students with a squad leader, a student. The awkward students are grouped in the same manner. The exercise of the cripple and the student with serious organic weakness is individualized. These special individualized cases are under the direct supervision of a physician on the staff.

ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDENTS FOR PRESCRIBED WORK IN THE COLLEGE COURSES

In this college, organized, directed physical exercise as outlined above is covered in the division of physical training, the division of recreation, and the division of athletics, all of which are subdivisions of the Department of Hygiene.

The enrollment in the required cla.s.ses in the division of Physical Training varies from thirty in the smaller cla.s.ses to over two hundred in the larger. The total enrollment has been approximately eleven hundred each term for several years. These courses are required of all students during the first four collegiate terms. Each of these four courses requires three hours a week, distributed over two or into three periods, and credits the student with one half point toward graduation. This time allowance is, however, inadequate.

The cla.s.s organization in the division of the Department of Hygiene is based on a unit composed of five students. Each of these units or squads contains one student who is designated as the "leader" of that unit.

Persistent effort is made to a.s.sign students of like physical development and needs to the same squads. In this manner a single cla.s.s of a hundred young men will have a graduation on the basis of proficiency which makes it possible for the teacher to come very near to the rational application of exercise for the individual student.

These units or squads are organized into divisions, each division being made up of four squads. Each division is under the supervision and instruction of a member of the departmental staff. In any given cla.s.s, then, there is a regular instructor for each group of twenty students, and a student leader for each group of four students. The aim in this organization is to establish a relationship between the instructor and his twenty students that will secure for him an intimate knowledge of each young man, relating to his physical training needs, general and special.

=A cla.s.s period in physical exercise=

A typical cla.s.s period is made up of a short health talk, 10 minutes; a ma.s.s drill, 10 minutes; apparatus period, two changes, 20 minutes; and a play period, 15 minutes. If the health talk is not given the play period is lengthened.

The ma.s.s drills referred to above are made up of drill in marching and in gymnastics with and without hand apparatus. These drills are graded within the term and from term to term so that a desirable variety is secured. They are devised for disciplinary, postural, developmental, and health purposes. During the progress of the drill the instructors present inspect the posture and work of the students in their divisions.

The apparatus periods referred to include work on the conventional pieces of gymnastic apparatus, with the addition of chest weights, an indoor track, and a swimming pool. The squad organization for this work gives opportunity for the development of student leadership which is often of extraordinary educational value to the individual boy.

These periods, because of this squad organization, may be utilized for such _special exercise_ emphasis as may be decided upon for any given group of students. It is here that _special conditioning_ may be given those young men who are planning for military training or who need selected exercise for neuro-muscular development.

The play period in the regular cla.s.s program is devoted largely to looser games that contain a predominating element of big muscle activities. Compet.i.tion is a fairly constant factor. Here, again, our squad unit permits us to a.s.sign selected groups of students to special types of games. It is feasible, in this organization, to satisfy a need for the training that is furnished by highly organized games, fighting games, and by games and out-of-door events that develop special groups of muscles and special coordinations.

A well-organized Collegiate Department of Physical Training could cooperate very effectively with a Collegiate Department of Military Training. The squad organization in apparatus periods and in play periods offers the best possible avenue for a successful emphasis of several of the very important phases of military physical training.

=Recreational facilities in addition to prescribed work=

The division of recreation in the Department of Hygiene in the College of the City of New York, takes charge of all recreational and athletic s.p.a.ce and all recreational and intramural athletic activities in those periods of the day in which regular cla.s.s work does not take precedence. Students of all cla.s.ses are admitted freely throughout their four collegiate years to these activities, and a studied effort is made to increase their attractiveness as well as to secure from them their full social and character-training values. Such values depend to a very large degree upon the experienced supervision and direction given these activities. It does not follow that the creation of play opportunity is bound to produce good citizenship. The quality of the product depends upon the quality of the man or men in charge of the enterprise.