Some preschools encourage more physical activity than others, and all have a strong influence on how active students are in their daily lives, new research reports.

U.S. investigators found that children who were very physically active tended to attend preschools that allow children to get a significant amount of exercise every day.

Lead author Dr. Russell R. Pate said that it is not clear how long this tendency towards activity will last once preschool is over, but, based on recent evidence, kids who are active in preschool will likely stay active “at least for a few years into the future.”

Pate, who is based at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, explained that most of this school time activity likely occurs during “free play” moments, when kids are allowed to run around outside.

Although preschools do need to concentrate on preparing children for school, administrators should not ignore the importance of giving kids time to let loose, activity-wise, he said. For instance, kids who run around with each other outside learn how to interact with other kids, and research suggests that movement can facilitate brain development, Pate said.

Free play is “not necessarily frivolous, wasted time,” he told Reuters Health.

“We want to do everything we can to get kids ready for first grade, but little kids need to move,” Pate added.

Indeed, recent guidelines suggest that preschool-aged kids should be physically active for at least 2 hours each day, through both structured activities and free play.

To investigate whether preschool can influence a child’s activity levels, Pate and his colleagues attached a device to 281 children that measures how active they are throughout the day. Children attended nine different preschools, and wore the device for an average of 4-1/2 hours per day for approximately one week.

Reporting in the journal Pediatrics, the investigators found that children who were more active tended to attend preschools where other kids were also very active, suggesting that the schools made physical activity a priority.

Moreover, the amount of physical activity incorporated into children’s lives varied greatly from preschool to preschool. For instance, the average number of minutes of moderate physical activity ranged from 4.4 to 10.2 minutes per hour.

And although boys tended to be more active than girls, and black children more active than white children, the type of preschool kids attended had a much stronger influence over how active they were, Pate said in an interview.

“The policies and practices of schools make a difference,” he said. “They really do influence the amount of activity kids get.”

SOURCE: Pediatrics, November 2004.