Physical activity across the curriculum (PAAC3): Testing the application of technology delivered classroom physical activity breaks

Abstract

Only 43% of children in the U.S., ages 6-11 yrs., meet current physical activity (PA) guidelines. To satisfy the MVPA requirement, schools have begun incorporating MVPA in the form of activity breaks or MVPA academic lessons. We completed two, 3 academic-yr. cluster randomized trials (DK61489, DK85317) called "Physical Activity Across the Curriculum" (PAAC) which involved increasing MVPA in the classroom. Across 3-yrs. teachers in PAAC schools delivered ~60 min/wk. (12 min/day) of MVPA. Although short of our MVPA goal (20 min/d), the PAAC approach substantially increased in-school MVPA. Teacher reluctance to devote additional time to develop and integrate PA lessons into their curriculum was the overwhelming barrier to meeting the MVPA goal. Therefore, to reduce barriers to delivery of classroom PA we developed a 3-academic yr. cluster randomized trial (2 yrs. active intervention, 1 yr. follow-up) to compare the effectiveness and sustainability of technology delivered (PAAC-R) and classroom teacher delivered (PAAC-T) activity breaks for increasing classroom MVPA in elementary school students in grades 2 and 3 at baseline who will progress to grades 4-5. NCT registration: NCT03493139.

Keywords: Classroom; Elementary students; Physical activity; Technology.

Figure 1.

Power Note. This figure presents power estmiates (y–axis) over a range of effect sizes (x–axis), with n=8, J=100, K=16, ρ = 0.07 and 0.12, and R²=0.60. The red arrow indicates the effect size (δ=0.35) produces 80% power at 5% alpha level.