Comments on: On the ball

By: PeterW

PeterW — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 17:54:16 +0000

This seems like a great idea. I can’t help but notice that my chair in my office swivels, has a back that tilts up and down, is height adjustable, and is on wheels. And is padded! I suspect that I would be much less productive if my chair were hard plastic or wood and bolted to my desk at an arbitrary fixed distance. (You could probably equip a couple of classrooms with stability balls for the cost of my desk chair, too, so someone should be applauded for finding a solution cheap enough to actually be implemented).

By: Bart

Bart — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 06:16:45 +0000

“Teachers have bigger balls.”

By: BadaBing

BadaBing — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 18:49:16 +0000

Could you put a bumper sticker on your car that says, “My Students Have Balls”?

By: Tracy W

Tracy W — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 09:39:30 +0000

One of my cousins used one of those balls as her work chair for a time when she was suffering from lower back problems, and they cleared it up. Now she teaches primary school, so she’s on her feet at least half the day, so that also works.

By: Richard Brandshaft

Richard Brandshaft — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 05:57:11 +0000

Sitting on balls is also recommended by fitness instructors–not a trivial advantage today.

The idea is that you can’t actually sit still on one (true at least for me) so you are constantly working your abdominal muscles to stay upright.

By: KauaiMark

KauaiMark — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 22:02:52 +0000

“…they aren’t required to wear knee pads and helmets while sitting on those balls!”

That comes next after the first lawsuit filed by a parent whose kid got hurt by “falling off his ball” when he fell asleep in class.

By: Mia

Mia — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 15:28:06 +0000

I’m surprised they aren’t required to wear knee pads and helmets while sitting on those balls!

By: Lightly Seasoned

Lightly Seasoned — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 13:47:01 +0000

Again, nothing new under the sun. This sort of thought has been around regarding ADHD/Autistic kids for a long time. If you’d like to see more research on it, those are the key words I’d use to search ERIC.

I keep a couple of old, mostly broken, rolling office chairs in my room for my fidgety kids. My bigger boys also use them because the desks are too small to be comfortable (the kids are not fat, but up around 6’4″).

By: allen

allen — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 13:28:42 +0000

“Research is starting to back up that theory.”

I’m glad a discovery as momentous as this will soon be backed up by research although a survey of the opinions of 52 students might generate some skepticism among the less generous about the definition of the word “research” that’s being used by the good professor.