INNOVATIVE MODELS OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION, HEALTH IMPROVEMENT, AND SPORTS MASS PROGRAMS IN SECONDARY EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS: THE EXPERIENCE OF THE USA

Abstract

The article explores the innovative experience of reforming the physical education sector in the United States of America in line with the ideas of the domestic reform «New Ukrainian School». The article’s goal is to analyze, based on the study of normative acts and scientific literature, the modern programs organizing recreational, health-improving, and mass sports activities, both during and outside school hours, in the United States of America. It aims to determine the prospects for further implementing them into the Ukrainian school physical education practice.The analysis of progressive foreign experience, particularly innovative programs such as «Active Schools», «Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child», and the «Program of Comprehensive School Physical Activity», implemented at the national level in US general secondary education institutions, is aimed at implementing a global strategy to increase schoolchildren’s level of physical activity. This strategy focuses on forming a physically healthy, emotionally stable, and harmoniously developed generation that comprehends the importance of an active lifestyle, healthy nutrition, and aims for self-improvement.We’ve found that the identified innovative models for developing school physical culture in the USA show promise for utilization in Ukraine. Consistently, we define the ideas as follows: strengthening the educational emphasis of the discipline, thereby enhancing its status as a factor for increasing academic achievement and the socialization of students; reinforcing requirements for professional, particularly organizational and methodological, preparation of future physical education teachers; uniting schools and communities, educators, and parents, and engaging specialists (psychologists, doctors, dieticians, fitness trainers, etc.) to establish a culture of health, improve the physical fitness of students; directing both in-school and extracurricular physical activities toward wellness, promoting new forms of activity; enhancing the infrastructure of general secondary education institutions, making them inclusive and barrier-free for engaging in recreational and mass sports physical culture among different segments of the population.