Parents are being asked to help their children with their homework - by getting on their bikes.
A south Wales school is setting Year 9 pupils a 20-minute homework of non-stop exercise with their mum or dad, as part of a course combining IT and PE.
Dave Satterly, who teaches the course at St Cenydd secondary in Trecenydd, Caerphilly, said it encouraged healthier lifestyles. Parents and pupils are running together, playing badminton, or doing circuit training in their back yards. One dad joined his daughter on her plug-in dancemat.
The school also works with the council’s sports development team to promote activities at community leisure centres, and at local healthy living centres for those who are too embarrassed to go to sports centres.
In lessons, pupils use digital cameras and heart-rate monitors to record their progress in PE and then head for the computer room to generate graphs and spreadsheets recording their progress for presentations to classmates.
Mr Satterly, a PE teacher, came up with the scheme - now in its fourth year -after school managers decided they wanted more PE and IT in the timetable.
