Does Additional Physical Education Improve Exam Performance at the End of Compulsory Education? A Secondary Analysis from a Natural Experiment: The CHAMPS-Study DK

Abstract

It remains unclear whether the provision of additional physical activity in school improves academic outcomes. We conducted a secondary analysis of the Childhood Health, Activity, and Motor Performance School Study Denmark (CHAMPS-study DK), a natural experiment based on a trebling of curricular physical education, to investigate whether children receiving additional physical education performed better on their academic exams at the conclusion of compulsory education (i.e., 9th grade). Children from six intervention schools received 3–7 years of exposure to 270 weekly minutes of physical education (sports schools), while children from four control schools received the 90-min national standard (normal schools). Academic performance was based on the standard Danish 7-point scale (ranging from −03 to 12) and retrieved from national registries. The primary outcome was calculated as the average exam grade. Comparisons of participants at sports and normal schools were adjusted for individual socioeconomic factors and school-level academic environment. There were no differences in the pooled exam performance among 691 sports- and 510 normal-school participants (0.20 (95% confidence interval: −0.12 to 0.52)). Results for subject-specific exams indicated similar results. This analysis from a non-randomized natural experiment did not provide evidence that simply adding additional physical education is sufficient to affect academic performance relative to the national standard.

La composición corporal como medición indirecta de la actividad física y su relación con el rendimiento académico en estudiantes del Grado de Educación Infantil

“…Así pues, se puede afirmar que gran mayoría de los estudiantes presentan niveles saludables de IMC, siendo más común en mujeres que en hombres, debido a que la mayoría de los hombres presentan un IMC negativo, considerado sobrepeso u obesidad. Por otro lado, las mejores calificaciones se encuentran en personas con normopeso y sobrepeso de tipo I, afirmando así las conclusiones de Barth et.al (2021), quien demuestra que no existe asociaciones significativas entre la AF y el RA en su estudio y de Tarp et al (2021), quien demuestra que el aumento de horas de educación física no mejora el RA de los alumnos en relación con el horario estándar.…”

The importance of physical education and sport in primary (Elementary) school

“…Many parents take their children out of sports and physical education when preparing for examinations. Additionally, some teachers may cut into PE lessons as examinations approach to create more time for doing revisions (Tarp et al, 2021) [23] . The general perception among such teachers and parents is that time spent in PE is wasted since it does not directly correlate to examination results.…”

“…Spending every waking moment buried under books results in monotony and quickly causes burnout among the students. Consequently, children may spend the whole day reading books but need help to grasp meaningful content (Tarp et al, 2021) [23] . On the other hand, spending 30 minutes in physical education or sports activities may provide the brain with much-needed rekindling and facilitate subsequent understanding of content.…”

“…Less intensive physical exercises such as yoga may be performed during examinations to ease stress and anxiety. Parents who compel their children to take a break from physical education and sports deny them an opportunity for effective stress and anxiety management (Tarp et al, 2021; James et al, 2023) [23,12] . Engagement in exercise produces dopamine and serotonin, creating higher moods among children.…”

A model for evaluating the performance of compulsory education inputs in ethnic areas in China

“…When it comes to evaluating the efficacy of compulsory education inputs in these regions, however, research is lacking. Previous studies highlight some related issues like compulsory education [ 4 , 5 , [15] , [16] , [17] , [18] , [19] ], education inputs [ [20] , [21] , [22] ], and education resources [ 8 , 23 , 24 ]. Several studies also focus on the relationship between education inputs or resources and performance [ 3 , 8 , 25 , 26 ].…”