EWG

=__Observations 1__=

Observations on Heart Monitor use at EWG.

Since the beginning of the project I have been experiencing computer problems and have been frustrated. I have since borrowed a computer from a colleague's ILF and it seems to be fairly reliable. Jamie Henderson was an invaluable asset to me this past week as he came in and gave me an excellent inservice. I am on my way...

Prior to having the classes and monitors set up for each student, I experimentd with several classes. We shared several interesting episodes. I have already entered several of my observations in a previous discussion entry and will continue on with new material.

A good teaching point presented itself to me very early: a fairly portly child asked me to answer a question. She asked why her heart rate was so high compared to everyone else while at rest. Another larger student from another class asked later why she was in the zone much faster than anyone else with a little effort and then, "WAY ABOVE ZONE" when she worked only at a slow walk. Iasked if I could generalise and bring it up in the debriefing later. She was fine with that and seemed to have a 'light bulb moment' as I explained the answere in a general sense to the class.

I have been experiencing a common theme with the elite athletes in my classes. They have very quick recovery and often want to work in the 'above the zone' range.They explain that they 'want to go hard' because they have to in games. They often complain that they do not feel like they are challenged working at the zone rates. This is a very difficult concept to get them to accept. I believe that seeing the breakdown on the report section shows them what their 'pie' looks like compared to someone who stays in the zone the majority of the time.

I noted that the older students did not want to take the time to do the management part, they just wanted to go.Yet, they were frustrated by their ignorance to the way the monitors worked. The younger students seemed more apt to listen, read the instruction and then look at the banner pictures. For the most part, they are self sufficient and can get prepared by themselves and put the equipment away cleaned and ready.

An issue of note: Students do experience difficulty with attaching the harness. I could see potential problems with students asking for help attaching the harness. They are very self-conscience and may not want a teacher to adjust their harness; especially female children. I mostly get them to have me adjust the harness on the outside of their clothing and then they can re adjust later in private. Some students are not very self aware and will walk up to the teacher and pull their shirts up and ask for help.This is quickly discouraged and we procede with the shirt-down method with me always asking permission to touch their harness.

Early on I had problems with students thinking the test was to see who could attain the highest heart rate over the period. Some athletes were disappointed as they were required to slow down to fall within range on the zone. I allowed the classes on theire first day to just experiment and play with the system.

The next test day was to discover which activity they could do that would get them in the zone fast and maintain the zone by doing consistant movement without breaks.Everyone agreed that rope skipping was indeen the best exercise for 'zone balance'.

Problems:There were and still are several problems that the students and I have encountered. Initially, several students were using a harness that was too large. The contact points were interrupted quite often and consistant ongoing recording was a problem.When the data was downloaded, there were periods with no data. Another problem is a simple one but quite costly when it comes to data is that several students did not read the banners carefully. After the initial stage, I was relying on the students to set up by themselves.There were three students that were forgetting to press the recore button and had no data to load. I have had two students out of the whole group that would forget to check which monitor was assigned to them (yes, I post the list every day). I was having a difficult time figuring out why the 'extra' data was there with no assigned name for the time. These students were using the wrong monitor. I'm still not too sure about a couple of things; one being whether or not the monitor is still recording when it shows zero yet the icon 'heart' is still flashing.I'll ask Jamie or Eddy about this. there are still a few who do not check closely enough when stopping the recording. They press the blue button twice but fail to check if the monitor is back to 'time mode'. Later when I go to downlaod, I usually find one to two monitors that were not stopped. Another issue that I continue to think about a lot is the adjustment of harnesses.Because my children are quite 'comfortable' with me, they will walk up to me and ask me to 'fix' their harness. Yet, I feel a bit out of my comfort zone especially with older female students. I usually ask them to help each other in the changeroom. This could be a point of concern especially for male teachers.

=__Observations 2__=

Over a period of two months there seems to be a good deal of learning. Firstly, the students in general have become familiar with useage and maintenance of equipment.The equipment is cleaned after each use and placed in the starage area. The students for the mast part have become familiar with the technique of monitor usage and personal fitting i.e. what size harness fits me and what is my number for the monitor. With this all in place, looking at the data, I have made several interesting observations. First; there are very few reasons for the students being outside of the zone.It is very easy to detect which students are not pushing at all; those who are coasting, those who are trying to stay in the zone and those who push much too hard. A very positive observation is that when I show the students their report on the computer and they 'see' their times in, above, and below, they either know exactly what they need to do to improve, or they ask how to improve. As a teacher, I have the opportunity to speak to individuals about how they feel when they have to work to stay in the zone, and for many students who are not strong skill-wise, (they seem to have always slipped through the cracks in terms of skills), and especially; and perhaps more importantly, in terms of cardiovascular fitness. These students are now asking how to achieve better fitness. In the same token, a student who is capable and only pushes when the teacher is 'looking' is no longer able to 'slide'--the data speaks for itself. As the students improve in maintenance of equipment, I have been enabled to spen more time looking at statistics and making reports. What I have noticed and am persently addressing is that there are several students who are still not pressing the red record button i.e. the second time as the banner shows them to do. I have been stressing that they are losing valuable data on their own performances and not reaping the benefit of seeing a report that demonstrates their improvements. The positive part of this, in spite of forgetting to record this important data, is that they are achieving one of the initial goals of learning just how much to push themselves to get in the 'proper' zone for maximum cardiovascular benefit. They are checking their monitors to see the rates and are physically aware of how they are feeling when they are in the zone. Also the students are aware of how hard their peers are working and do likewise. I believe that the next phase that I will go to is to have the students monitor each other when I call out "monitor check" this way each student will have another set of eyes to check if they are recording and if they are above or below the zone, and be able receive that immediate feedback that the teacher may not be able to provide to individuals. I will also start to pass out more individual reports so they can see where they need improvement. I'm still thinking about a way to have them compare their results for motivation without them losing focus on the nature of individual health, i.e. it doesn't matter how hard you work, your results do not put me in better shape, it's what I do that counts. A lot of the students compete at high levels in hockey, basketball, soccer and wrestling. They are used to competitive type of challenges so they may be more apt to enjoy the comparison situations. I am troubled that if I were to persue this avenue, many of the non competitive students, which is the majority of students and the group that we need to target most, would get turned off to the project.