Handstands Banned?
Caught an article here that talked of an Australian school that BANNED cartwheels and handstands. Are you kidding me?? Now an education spokesman said that there’s not a blanket ban, but just that kids were banned from doing unsupervised “handstands, cartwheels and other gymnastic movements” during breaks. So in other words, we can’t have a kid play around unless they’re strictly supervised. What a sad state of affairs.
I taught myself my first handstand by myself out in my friend’s backyard. I use to go to my local school playground late at night and work back handsprings and front flips – sometimes with terrible results, but the point was that I was learning about the limits of myself.
Coddling and protecting kids too much prevents them from challenging themselves and developing a deeper level of self-reflection. We do them a great disservice. I can’t imagine who I’d be today if I didn’t test and challenge myself. If I wasn’t able to play around like I always wanted. If I had never learned a handstand.
The one saving grace in this article is that there was a community backlash to this ban. It seems that most people have the common sense to let kids be kids.
