Effects of a 16-Week Online Classroom Physical Activity Integration Course on Student-Level Outcomes

ABSTRACT

Background

Teachers can help students meet physical activity (PA) recommendations by integrating PA into the classroom. Few studies have evaluated student PA after teacher-received professional development. Purpose: This study measured student PA outcomes from an online, 16-week course for teachers on classroom PA integration. Course-enrolled (“intervention”) teachers were asked to integrate 30 minutes of daily PA into their classrooms and collaborate with teachers in their school, referred to as “PA Partners.” Methods: Eighty-two students from the classrooms of seven teachers (3 intervention, 4 PA Partners) wore accelerometers during school at the beginning and end of the 16-week course. Multilevel mixed effect models were used to examine PA pre to post. Results: At the beginning of the course, students with intervention teachers spent a larger percentage of time in moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA) than students of PA Partners. MVPA did not change across the duration of the course for intervention students, but MVPA for students of PA Partners increased significantly (boys: 3.3%; girls: 1.6%; p < .01). Discussion: Findings suggest the course had ancillary impacts on non-enrolled PA Partners. Translation to Health Education Practice: Health educators should encourage interpersonal-level resources from the social ecological model when training teachers to integrate classroom PA.

A AJHE Self-Study quiz is online for this article via the SHAPE America Online Institute (SAOI) http://portal.shapeamerica.org/trn-Webinars

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Michael Capps, Peter Stoepker, and Sara Deere from the University of Northern Colorado Active Schools Institute for their assistance with data collection and Cyrus Weinberger and Tanya Peal for developing and instructing the online course evaluated in this study.

Conflicts of interest

All authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Colorado Health Foundation [7574].