And if you did what class grade/year would it had happened? What decade (if your comfortable sharing)?
I am wondering how many people actually did this and from what locations/ages/years it would have happened. For my education (American elementary-college years 2000’s-2010’s) I never had to do that. I feel like I had to be common enough that it is referenced in movies and tv shows.
Yep. USian public school, middle school in the early 90’s. I think I was… 12 or 13. Never managed it because I had zero upper arm strength so I couldn’t even get my feet onto the knot on the bottom.
Sure did, I think it was part of a bunch of tests we had to do for the… Presidential Fitness Award or something?
It was done in Elementary school, so Fall 87->Spring 93? I have no idea if they’re still doing any of that crap now though.
I do remember it being the neatest dang thing because our school had like this entire wall of collapsible gym equipment that folded out like a playground with like 2 or 3 story monkeybars and gigantic poofy mats at the bottom, and you better believe some kids fell off.
The more I think about it, the more I suspect they don’t let them do that anymore
ELEMENTARY! I feel like that is wild.
Haha yeah it sounds like a crazy fun playground filled with danger.
honestly I think the last time I could have pulled it off was elementary. I went from a skinny stick to mr. chubs in a flash in 6th grade. though maybe it was because I didn’t have any ropes to climb anymore?
Climbing is way, way easier for younger children.
I’m probably five years younger than you. We had rope climbing but it wasn’t part of the Presidential Physical Fitness Award (which I am seemingly deeply proud of actually having managed in the third grade, despite being crap at pull ups, and I was even worse at rope climbing).
No, I always thought it seemed stupidly dangerous. What happens if a kid falls and cracks their noggin. seems like an unnecessary liability
This was my thought when I first heard of it. My school wouldn’t let us on the playground when it was wet because we might slip on the monkey bars haha
Yup. Canada, early 90s. Up to the gymnasium ceiling and big jump to the crash mats. Only once it twice though. I found it extremely difficult and struggled all the way. Some of my classmates were able to do it no sweat.
As for age. Under 11. So, maybe 9 o 10?
That’s wild to imagine! Any recollection of how high up those ceilings might have been? The gyms I remember in the US had ceilings that were something like 2 or 3 stories high, if I had to guess. That strikes me as quite the height to jump for a fitness test. Just for the height factor alone I can’t picture myself having the guts back then to do it. Dunno if I’d even have 'em now 😨.
Probably around 2 stories. Mrs. Klinghammer, the gym teacher, was a little intense at times.
Yep, I remember doing it at least a couple years in a row in elementary school (I might have been 9 or 10?) - this was in France, in the early 00s.
Yes–elementary school (K-3) in Illinois, early 1990s. I was crap at it. We also had gymnastics rings.
I’m pretty sure none of the other schools I went to had ropes or rings in the gym, used or not.
I definitely remember climbing a rope in PE in like 3rd or 4th grade which would be around '99. Washington State btw.
Western US here. We had a rope climb twice a year from 4th to 9th grade. I tried the first time and then refused every time after that.
Never did get any flak for it. Can only assume they knew it was dangerous and were happy to have kids skip it.
Yes. US elementary school in the 1970s. Can’t remember how high they wanted us to climb, but it was a 2 story gym.
Yes, we did this in late elementary school (I want to say 5th grade, or 10-11ish years old?), but did not do it beyond that. There were two ropes–one standard rope and one with evenly spaced knots that you could use to climb with hand and footholds. This was in the '90s.
No, and I couldn’t have if I tried. I’ve always been bottom heavy: I was a runner and long-distance cyclist with some soccer in there, too. Wide birthing hips but not much in the way of arm and shoulder muscles. That began to change when I started lifting weights in college, but in high school? No way.
yep elementary school in the 90’s. we rang a little bell when we got to the top. it was fun!
At my elementary school in Michigan in the 90s, the rope got hung up once and we could try but it wasn’t a requirement.
Nah. They had a vertical bar that you had to do a pull up on which I think replaced it. Graduated in 2010
No, not really. Graduated from high school in California in 2017. Both my middle and high school, however, had the equipment and stations on hand. It feels relevant to mention we also had what looked like climbing pegboard stations: boards on a wall that’d go something like 6 – 10 ft., 1.8 – 3m high that someone would climb with pegs. We didn’t use those, either.
There might’ve been one or a few times that my freshman PE teacher had us climb or swing on a rope as part of a circuit? He had the good graces, at least, to give the rope foot and hand knots to work with. That was definitely an exception, however, and wasn’t part of anything mandated by the district nor the state. Pretty wild, though. I kinda wish my schools did more to push that. I sure wasn’t the athletic type, but my arm strength could’ve benefitted from it.
