Field Day: A Study in Chaos

Field day.

Ungh.

I shudder at the prospect. As if middle school wasn’t chaotic enough… But someone had to invent a day to uncage students from the classroom. It’s like a zoo without bars- literally!

I can’t even say that the field day schedule brings “organized” chaos. Four revisions later, and the principal still needs to make an all-call announcement for the teacher to check their email one last time for the latest draft… and just minutes before the festivities begin!

What!?!? An hour of basketball? The kids don’t want to play basketball! Yeah, they might whine and cry that they want to go outside, but 15-minutes of direct sunlight and they are whining and crying to be let back into school. Let them back in, and fifteen minutes later they want back out. They aren’t happy inside; they aren’t happy outside. They just want to be somewhere other than where they are at that particular moment- end of story.

Then there are the teachers. Did you know that some teacher plan to call in sick for the day just so they don’t have to bother with field day supervision? They don’t proactively protest and schedule a personal day; rather, they wait for the last minute to make their sick day call. “Mental health”, eh? Well that means madness for the rest of us. Thanks a lot! Talk about contracting June burnout (yeah, and it’s only May).

The real clincher? They took any element of competition out of field day. Years ago (well, ever year up through last year) “black” team competed against “silver” team in various mental and physical activities. The admin tallied the points from the day’s activities and a winner was declared. That was the motivation to participate. This year everyone is a “winner”. No, change that- they eliminated any semblance of sport. The kids played a game of basketball, watched a talent show, ate burgers, played on inflatable carnival rides, and then watched movies for the last two hours of the day.

Sigh.

Alright- so teachers will always begrudge the heat and hellish chaos of field day, but don’t take out the games. Some kids thrive on this day. Bring back the sport for them… or do away with the day altogether.

Tags: field day, school, education