Physical Education

PE is a vital foundation to help children lead active and healthy lives as they grow up - most schools will aim to make sure that the time your child spends about two hours per week undertaking some form of exercise. In physical education (PE), children learn that it's fun to stay in shape and they build on their natural enthusiasm for movement, using it to explore and learn about their world. By listening, watching and experimenting, they develop their skills in coordination and movement, and learn to express and test themselves in a variety of situations.

Children are taught how to:

• follow rules
• move and play safely
• work on their own and with others
• move rhythmically and expressively, showing their imagination.
• link together, movements, shapes and balances
• use their skills in games to score points or goals against others

At the end of Key Stage 1 (age 7), most children are able to:

• enjoy being physically active
• remember and repeat skills, performing them with control and co-ordination
• choose the right skills for what they are doing
• pick out and copy actions
• move in time to a beat, showing their ideas and feelings in short dances
• make up and perform short gymnastic sequences that join actions together
• use tactics in simple games to score points against an opponent
• describe what they and others do well, and suggest how to improve