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The school programme of the Move, Debrecen! Movement provides free participation in the accredited training programme “Smart PE” (in Hungarian called OkosTesi) for coordinators in participating educational institutions. The Vörösmarty Mihály Elementary School and Primary Art School in Debrecen hosted the training of nearly 30 primary school coordinators on the 4th of February 2025.
In connection with the event, Deputy Mayor Diána Széles, one of the founders of the Move, Debrecen! Movement, said that the results of the studies conducted within the framework of the school health programme in Debrecen show, among other things, that due to excessive digitalization, children are moving less and less and spending less time outdoors. The goal of the Move, Debrecen! Movement’s school programme is to encourage those children who need some kind of movement or skill development. The school administrators are grateful that today nearly 1,200 children in the city, emphatically not certified athletes, are exercising regularly at school, but outside of school hours as part of the movement’s school programme too. The results can already be seen, as according to surveys, the proportion of children with movement problems has decreased by one percent over the past year. The school administrators, programme coordinators and physical education teachers working in the institutions are doing a lot for the success and popularity of the programme. The Move, Debrecen! Movement thanks them for this work done with all their heart and soul by ensuring their participation in the “Smart PE” further training programme, also in order to allow teachers to develop their knowledge even further and become even more up-to-date, as “Smart PE” is for today’s children.
The “Smart PE” accredited training was created and coordinated by the President of the Health-Developing Association for Quality Physical Education in Hungary (EMTM), Zoltán Vass. As he explained, “Smart PE” is different from a normal PE class in that, in addition to the movement tasks, there is always some cognitive, thinking task that the children have to do, so not only their bodies but also “their minds get tired.”. Since the individual tasks are not repeated often, only two or three times, new and different tasks follow each other frequently, making the movement experience exciting. According to Zoltán Vass, this way, the children, but also the physical education teachers, become more motivated and stronger, and everyone develops their movement coordination.
As part of the Move, Debrecen! school programme, an initiative called “1 minute for health in everyday life” is currently being run on a trial basis in institutions maintained by the Debrecen Education District Center, such as the Debrecen Vörösmarty Mihály Primary School and Primary Art School. The goal of this is to help first-graders learn proper posture, correct movement patterns, and improve their mental health by learning certain relaxation techniques to prevent spinal problems and to help them cope with stress more easily. The aim is that children in the first grade, with the help of their teachers, will regularly do short, simple, useful preventive exercises before, during, or after lessons, and that they will continue to do them in their daily lives at school in the coming years.
Source and photo credit:debrecen.hu
