Key Points
Back to top- Movement plays a key role in improving mood, supporting cognitive functioning, and contributing to long-term physical and mental health, yet students often receive surprisingly few opportunities to move during the school day.
- When schools protect recess and thoughtfully incorporate movement throughout the day, they can create calmer classrooms, reduce conflict, and increase the amount of time students are prepared to learn.
- Schools do not always need expensive programs, specialized facilities, or major schedule changes to make movement a more consistent part of students’ experiences; small, intentional shifts can have a meaningful impact.
Movement plays an important role in many of our lives. After a day of sitting at a desk and moving from meeting to meeting, even a short midday walk can reenergize our bodies and sharpen our thinking. We also prioritize movement for the children in our families. We enroll them in sports, visit parks and playgrounds, take camping trips, and fill their afternoons and summers with opportunities for active play.
Research confirms what many of us instinctively know: Movement can improve mood, support cognitive functioning, and contribute to long-term physical and mental health.
Yet despite the value we place on movement in our personal lives, we often provide our students with surprisingly few opportunities to move during the school day. Students may spend seven hours at school while receiving only one 20-minute recess period. Some do not consistently receive even that. Recess is frequently withheld from students who have unfinished assignments or who have experienced behavioral challenges, even though those students may need movement, connection, and regulation the most.
Access to movement should not be treated as a reward for compliance. It is a basic developmental need.
Movement Supports the Whole Child
Back to topChildren and adolescents need daily physical activity to support healthy development. The American Academy of Pediatrics and other public health organizations recommend that school-age children receive at least 60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity each day.
Movement also supports learning. Brief activity breaks can improve students’ attention, engagement, and readiness to participate. During recess, students connect socially, practice communication and conflict-resolution skills, negotiate rules, collaborate, and build relationships through both structured and unstructured play. These are not separate from social and emotional learning. They are opportunities to practice it.
Movement can be especially important for students experiencing stress or adversity. Physical activity and play can provide an outlet for tension, help students regulate their energy, and create moments of joy and connection during the school day. Removing recess as a consequence may therefore undermine the very regulation and relationship-building skills schools want students to develop.
When schools protect recess and thoughtfully incorporate movement throughout the day, they can create calmer classrooms, reduce conflict, and increase the amount of time students are prepared to learn.
The Evidence Is Not New
Back to topExamples of movement transforming school culture and learning are abundant. In Spark, John Ratey describes how schools in Naperville, Illinois, used physical activity as part of a broader effort to support student well-being and academic performance.
More recently, Jeff Li, founder of The Movement Factor, partnered with Meeting Street Schools to test three approaches to increasing movement: a before-school morning play period, brief “brain boost” activities integrated throughout the day, and strategically adding movement activities before testing. The results demonstrated strong student enthusiasm and increased teacher investment in movement as a strategy for supporting engagement and achievement.
The takeaway is clear: Schools do not always need expensive programs, specialized facilities, or major schedule changes to make movement a more consistent part of students’ experiences. Small, intentional shifts can have a meaningful impact.
Making Movement Part of Learning
Back to topAs the founder of the Whole Child Model, my goal is to help schools address students’ physical, social, and emotional needs alongside their academic and cognitive development. Movement for Learning is one strategy for doing so.
Through this approach, educators learn concrete ways to incorporate movement into academic instruction, classroom transitions, and moments when students’ energy levels signal a need to reset. We also provide guidance for facilitating strong recess periods and using structured small-group recess to support students who are still learning how to play safely and successfully.
Instead of taking recess away, educators can use recess as an opportunity to teach. Students can practice joining games, resolving disagreements, reading social cues, taking turns, and managing frustration with appropriate adult support. This approach preserves students’ access to movement while helping them build the skills they need to participate more independently over time.
Our aim is to make these resources available to as many educators as possible, particularly those serving students who have historically had the fewest opportunities for movement, play, and joyful connection at school.
Movement is not time away from learning. It is one of the ways children learn, regulate, connect, and thrive. When schools recognize movement as an essential part of the student experience, they create conditions in which more children are ready and able to succeed.
The views in this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of CASEL.
Cynthia Robinson-Rivers is a partner at Transcend where she supports schools as they adopt the Whole Child Model that she developed while serving as head of school at Van Ness Elementary (DC Public Schools). Before school leadership, Cynthia worked in DCPS central office on human capital initiatives related to teacher evaluation, recognition, and retention, developing the district’s teacher career ladder LIFT during that time. In the classroom, Cynthia taught early childhood and elementary students in public and charter schools in DC and California. She holds a B.A. in Communication and Art from Stanford University, M.A. in Education from George Washington University, and EML from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University.
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