Classroom Activities

Movement integration (MI) is a strategy for integrating physical activity into general
education classroom time. National organizations have identified MI as a key strategy for
helping children accumulate the recommended 60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical
activity per day. Research has consistently demonstrated that MI can provide meaningful
amounts of physical activity, improve on-task behavior, enhance cognitive function, and
increase standardized test scores.This strategy is also increasingly important because
children spend less and less time in active school settings, such as recess and physical
education. However, teachers rarely incorporate MI into their classrooms.

In order to encourage teachers to use MI more regularly, it is essential to understand which
MI product attributes lead to greater use. While some work has been done to identify which
attributes of MI products enhance teacher use, this work has either examined the use of MI as
a general concept (i.e., what would make teachers more likely to infuse physical activity
[PA] into their classroom routines); or was conducted within the context of a single MI
product (i.e., what makes teachers more likely to implement a specific MI product, such as
Take 10).These approaches have two major limitations. First, studies that examined MI as a
general concept (i.e., what would make teachers more likely to infuse physical activity into
their classroom routines) are limited because teachers were not able to test MI products.
Second, because previous studies solicited feedback on a single MI product, even though
several MI products with varying attributes are available, teachers' ability to identify
desirable MI product attributes across MI products was limited.

Currently, six MI products are widely available to teachers. These products differ
significantly in their degree of (a) academic focus, (b) level of teacher involvement, and
(c) time commitment for planning and implementation. For example, Go Noodle is a website that
contains short (3-5 minute) videos of mostly non-academic MI activities. Teachers can simply
select a video to play. Conversely, the Take 10 product consists of activity cards that
present physical activities infused with academic content, plus instructions for how teachers
can organize and implement the activities. These two products represent opposite ends of the
MI product spectrum, but no one MI product includes all of the key attributes that may
encourage use. Understanding the attributes that teachers want in MI products would allow
researchers and educators to design products that have greater appeal and are more likely to
be used (i.e., increased implementation).

Product testing is one way to identify attributes that enhance or hinder uptake by teachers.
Product testing is the process of measuring the properties or performance of products. Two of
the most common product testing techniques are in-home use tests, and discrete choice
experiments (DCE). In-home use tests allow potential consumers (in this case teachers) to use
a product as they normally would in their natural setting. DCEs involve asking individuals to
identify their preferences when given a hypothetical set of attributes products could
contain.Product testing is essential when developing new products, because it can help to
produce superior products, by identifying critical attributes that consumers desire. Research
has categorically shown that including consumers in the development of new products is
critical to the success of the products. However, the process of developing previous MI
products has not included this step.

This study will expand the evidence related to implementation of MI by classroom teachers by
identifying product attributes that will lead to increased use of MI products by teachers. To
do this we will draw upon product testing research techniques to test widely-available MI
products and to identify attributes of MI products that make them more or less usable. We
will accomplish the following specific aims:

Aim 1: Identify the key attributes of Movement Integration products that teachers prefer and
do not prefer, using a DCE and in-class product testing.

Aim 2: Develop a prototype Movement Integration product that incorporates the critical
attributes identified by teachers in Aim 1.

Aim 3: Conduct a pilot test of the prototype Movement Integration product developed in Aim 2
to evaluate teacher implementation, the product's effect on children's activity levels during
classroom time, and cost.

This project is significant because MI can reach virtually all children each day at school.
The project is innovative because it will produce a MI product prototype using product
testing techniques with classroom teachers. The expected project outcome is a MI product
prototype with the potential to be more widely implemented throughout the country.

- Participants must be an elementary classroom teacher.

- Must be employed full time by their school district

- Must be the primary classroom teacher with a class of 15 or more students of
elementary age