Children who do star jumps during school lessons fare better in exams

Getting children to jump up, rather than put their hand up when they got the answer right, was one of the measures used  - Getty 
Getting children to jump up, rather than put their hand up when they got the answer right, was one of the measures used - Getty

Children asked to do star jumps during their lessons get better exam results, research has found.

Short bursts of exercise during school classes boosted performance by more than third, the analysis of 42 studies found.

University of College London researchers examined a range of schemes designed to increase activity levels among children aged between three and 14.

In some classes, pupils were asked to do star jumps while reciting their times tables. Others had to jump up and down a number of times to answer a maths question, while others were asked to run on the spot while pretending to travel the globe in geography lessons.

Children who took part in “physically active” lessons three times a week, for two years, did far better than their peers at spelling and maths, one study from the Netherlands found.

That difference, found in children aged eight and nine, was equivalent to an extra four months’ classes, researchers said.

Experts said that doing exercise during classes appeared to improve children’s focus on what they were learning, and create a “memorable experience” which helped children’s recall in exams.

The schemes were set up in a bid to increase children’s activity levels, without reducing academic teaching time.

The research, published in British Journal of Sports Medicine, concluded that such measures significantly increased outcomes during the lesson, with pupils appearing to pay more attention.

Overall, those taking part in active lessons saw 80 per cent improvement in performance during classes, research found.  And the study found that exam results among such children were boosted by 36 per cent.

Lead author Dr Emma Norris, from UCL Centre for Behaviour Change, said: “Physical activity is good for children’s health, and the biggest contributor of sedentary time in children’s lives is the seven or eight hours a day they spend in classrooms.

“Our study shows that physically active lessons are a useful addition to the curriculum. They can create a memorable learning experience, helping children to learn more effectively.”

The research involved 12,663 children from countries including the UK, United States,  Australia and the Netherlands.

Co-author Dr Tommy van Steen, from Leiden University, The Netherlands, said: “These improvements in physical activity levels and educational outcomes are the result of quite basic physical exercises. Teachers can easily incorporate these physical active lessons in the existing curriculum to improve the learning experience of students.”