Fitness Assessments for 3rd, 4th and 5th Grade

I would like to take a moment to help you understand the fitness tests your child will be taking this year. If you have a third grade student, this is the first time the student will be evaluated on their fitness skills as a formal assessment.

Sit ups
Students will be asked to complete as many sit ups as possible in one minute. These are full sit ups, not crunches. You may have been informed that crunches are a better exercise than sit ups. However, if we would like to be able to actually sit up from a lying down position with more ease, a full sit-up is a much more functional and effective exercise to complete. This is why we assess students using a full sit up.

Plank
Students are performing this exercise in a straight arm position with their hands on the ground. The plank is a wonderful exercise to help build core muscles that offer stability in everyday movement.

Continuous Jog
I have had some questions from students wondering why we switched from the mile run to a continuous jog. The continuous jog actually gives us more information about your students overall aerobic endurance versus the mile run. We ultimately want students to work at a sustained moderate intensity for a period of time. When practicing at home, consider a moderate intensity as a pace that allows you to talk a bit while jogging.

Sit and Reach
This is a flexibility assessment focused on the lower back and hamstring muscles. Our goal is for your child to be able to, at a minimum, touch their toes while keeping their legs flat on the ground. Good flexibility in this area of the body will decrease the occurrence of lower back pain and overall injury in that region of the body.

Practicing all of these skills at home will assist your student is maintaining a healthy lifestyle and allow them to be successful this year in Physical Education. Just like reading practice, exercise should be performed daily if we wish to see positive results!