Schools should not ignore physical education, because students who perform well in physical education also do better academically, as physical activity can help boost brain development, a study by National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) showed.
A research team analyzed the physical performance of 400,000 junior-high school students and their senior-high school entrance examination scores — the largest scale of such analysis in the nation — and found a positive correlation between their physical and academic performance, said Hong Tsung-min (洪聰敏), a physical education professor at the university.
Students were divided into three groups according to their overall physical capability, with the highest performing group scoring 284 out of 412 on average in the entrance exam, outscoring the lowest ranking group by 31 points.
Results were similar when students were divided into three groups according to cardiovascular fitness, with the highest performing group outscoring the lowest group by 32 points.
Students whose body mass index deviated from the recommended range also showed poorer academic results.
“Ninth-grade students with higher levels of fitness scored better in exams by a good margin, and they ended up in better high schools. The same results were found in both male and female students,” Hong said.
Students who showed a moderate improvement in physical education scores — 25 percent improvement or less — achieved best in the entrance exam with 276 points on average, while students with a significant decline in physical performance — more than 25 percent — scored lowest in the exam with 260 points.
Exercise can boost learning because it can stimulate brain activity, and people who exercise regularly have a larger hippocampus, which is responsible for learning and memory, Hong said.
Exercise also has a positive effect on the prefrontal cortex, which is associated with cognitive functions, he said.
“Physical education classes only take up two hours of junior-high school students’ weekly syllabus, and they are sometimes canceled so the time can be used to teach subjects in the entrance examination. However, that does not work for students academically, and it is highly recommended that physical education be allotted more time,” Hong said.
Jumping rope is one of the best exercises for students during the short 10-minute break between classes, as it can improve cardiovascular capacity, upper body and core muscle strength, and physical coordination, Hong said.
Exercise can also help relieve depression and improve emotional stability, while a sedentary lifestyle can be detrimental to health and learning ability, he said.
Other NTNU research on Internet addiction showed that college students who play video games more than 24 hours every week have brain wave patterns and prefrontal cortex responses similar to those of people with dementia, dean of student affairs Chang Shao-hsi (張少熙) said.
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read: