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Intra- and Extramural Sports
Sports programs have long been an integral part of the school setting. 
Sport is one of the four human activities, along with play, games, and work. 
According to Woods (2011, pp. 5-6), play is a “free activity that involves 
exploration, self-expression, dreaming, and pretending. Play has no firm 
rules and can take place anywhere.” Children’s play often involves physical 
movement. Games are forms of play “that have greater structure and are 
competitive. Games have clear participation goals . . . [and] are governed 
by informal or formal rules” (p. 5). Games can be sedentary or physical; 
involve competition, planning, and strategizing; and result in “prestige or 
status.” Sport is a specialized or higher order of play or games with special 
characteristics. It must involve physical movement and skill. It must be 
“competitive with outcomes that are important to those involved,” and 
“winning and losing are a critical part of competition.” Thus, an important 
aspect of sport is institutionalized competition under formal rules. Lastly, 
work is “purposeful activity that may include physical and mental effort 

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Educating the Student Body: Taking Physical Activity and Physical Education to School
Approaches to Physical Activity in Schools
 
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to perform a task, overcome an obstacle, or achieve a desired outcome.” 
Sport can be work.
It is important to note that children in schools can participate in sports 
as either players or spectators. Kretchmar (2005) suggests that playing 
sports at a young age tracks to becoming a loyal spectator in later years; 
however, being a spectator at a young age may not necessarily lead to 
active participation as a player. Chen and Zhu (2005) analyzed intuitive 
interest in physical activity among 5-year-olds using the nationally repre-
sentative sample from the U.S. Department of Education’s Early Childhood 
Longitudinal Study. The results of a logistic regression analysis showed that 
early exposure to watching a sport may have a negative effect on developing 
interest in actually playing the sport.
The discussion here focuses on institutionalized in-school sports and 
on children’s participation as players. In-school sports programs typically 
fall into two categories: intramural, or within a school, and extramural or 
interscholastic, or competition between schools (AAHPERD, 2011). The 
type and scope of each of these categories of sports vary by school size 
(Landis et al., 2007), location, and the socioeconomic status of students 
(Edwards et al., 2013). 
In the past 40 years, participation in sports has flourished both within 
and outside of schools. Although young children are not eligible for formal 
interscholastic competition until they reach secondary school, children (or 
their parents) with athletic aspirations start preparation for competition at a 
very young age. Results of the National Survey of Children’s Health (2007) 
showed that approximately 58.3 percent of 6- to 17-year-olds participated 
in sports teams or lessons over a 12-month period. The Centers for Disease 
Control and Prevention (CDC) (2012) reports that in 2011, 58 percent of 
high school students played on at least one sports team. Intramural sports 
clubs in middle and high schools also involve large numbers of students.