Health and Physical Education:
It is widely acknowledged that health is influenced by
biological, social, economic, cultural and political forces.
Access to basic needs like food, safe drinking water
supply, housing, sanitation and health services influences
the health status of a population, and these are reflected
through mortality and nutritional indicators. Health is a
critical input for the overall development of the child,
and it influences enrolment, retention and school
completion rates significantly. This curriculum area
adopts a holistic definition of health within which
physical education and yoga contribute to the physical,
social, emotional and mental development of a child.
Undernourishment and communicable diseases are
the major health problems faced by the majority of
children in India, from the pre-primary to the higher
secondary school stages. Therefore, the need to address
this aspect at all levels of schooling, with special attention
to vulnerable social groups and girl children. It is
proposed that the midday meal programme and medical check-ups be made a part of the curriculum and
education about health be provided that address the agespecific
concerns at different stages of development.
The idea of a comprehensive school health programme,
conceived in the 1940s, included six major components,
viz., medical care, hygienic school environment, and
school lunch, health and physical education. These
components are important for the overall development
of the child, and hence need to be included in the
curriculum. The more recent addition to the curriculum
is yoga. The entire group must be taken together as a
comprehensive health and physical education curriculum,
replacing the fragmentary approach current in schools
today. As a core part of the curriculum, time allocated
for games and for yoga must not be reduced or taken
away under any circumstances.
There is growing realisation that the health needs of
adolescents, particularly their reproductive and sexual health
needs, require to be addressed. Since these needs
predominantly relate to sex and sexuality, which is culturally
a very sensitive area, they are deprived of opportunities
to get the appropriate information. As such, their
understanding of reproductive and sexual health and their
behaviour in this regard are guided predominantly by
myths and misconceptions, making them vulnerable to
risky situations, such as drug/substance abuse and HIV/
AIDS transmission. Age- appropriate context-specific
interventions focused on adolescent reproductive and
sexual health concerns, including HIV/AIDS and drug/
substance abuse, therefore, are needed to provide children
opportunities to construct knowledge and acquire life skills,
so that they cope with concerns related to the process of
growing up.
