Expert Blog: Schools should unleash the power of physical activity to boost learning
Professor Simon Cooper, Professor of Physical Activity and Health at NTU’s School of Science & Technology, investigates how physical activity in schools can boost children’s cognitive function and support their learning.
By Professor Simon Cooper | Published on 16 January 2026
Categories: Press office; Research; School of Science and Technology;
We all know that physical activity is good for our health. However, we also know that this does not necessarily translate in to being physically active ourselves.
And the same applies in schools.
How much physical activity should children do?
The guidelines state that young people (aged 5-18 years old) should take part in an average of at least 60 minutes per day of moderate to vigorous intensity physical activity. However, fewer than half (49%) of young people achieve this recommendation, and perhaps even more concerning is that 28% of young people do not even reach half of the recommended level and actually achieve less than 30 minutes per day (Active Lives Survey, 2025).
Schools as a physical activity provider
Schools are a vital opportunity to promote physical activity in young people, as they allow us to reach virtually all young people and provide plentiful opportunities for physical activity within the school day (e.g. PE, break times, lunch times, after school clubs etc.).
However, in reality, opportunities for physical activity within the school day are not prioritised, and there has been a decline of 45,000 hours of PE delivery since the London Olympics in 2012 (Youth Sport Trust, 2025).
This corresponds to a reduction of around ten percent, whilst the time dedicated to subjects such as maths, English and science has increased by a similar amount. The re-prioritisation of school time towards the ‘core academic subjects’ is often done to enhance learning and boost academic outcomes. These are a key metric by which schools are judged.
However, work that we have conducted at Nottingham Trent University actually suggests that cutting PE time and opportunities for physical activity in the school day could indeed be having the exact opposite effect.
In primary schools, the most popular school-based physical activity intervention is The Daily Mile, which involves 15 minutes per day where children go outside and walk, jog or run laps of the school playground or playing field. Our work has shown that completing The Daily Mile, every day for six weeks, enhanced executive function in primary school children. Executive function is our ability for complex and higher-order thinking, and has been shown to affect academic outcomes. Thus, by prioritising physical activity and completing The Daily Mile every day, school children can boost their cognition and learning.
… and what about secondary schools?
In secondary schools, we have shown that various forms of physical activity have beneficial effects on subsequent cognition, including intermittent running, games-based activity (basketball and football), and a PE lesson. We have also shown that where this activity is performed can be important, with outdoor activity producing superior cognitive benefits when compared to indoor activity.
Importance of individuality
We must also consider the individual child when considering how physical activity affects cognition. There are many individual characteristics that may influence the cognitive effects of physical activity. For example, the fitness of the young person. When a mixed group of young people all played basketball in one of our studies, the cognitive benefits were only evident for the fitter young people. We hypothesise that this is because, in a game such as basketball, the lower fit children were having to work very hard physically (relative to the fitter young people) and subsequently become too tired and their cognitive performance was not able to improve.
Another important factor is neurodiversity. Our research group have conducted a series of studies examining the effects of physical activity in young people living with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). Here, the potential of physical activity is perhaps even greater, with cognitive benefits from acute bouts of physical activity, and those young people who are more active in their everyday lives also demonstrating superior cognitive performance. In fact, in young people living with ADHD physical activity can help to offset some of the symptoms associated with the condition.
Re-prioritising physical activity
Therefore, I would urge schools and policy makers to stop devaluing and deprioritising physical activity (and PE) in the school curriculum. By providing young people with the opportunity to be active at school, we can unleash the power of physical activity and boost not only young people’s health, but also their learning.
Professor Simon Cooper is a Professor of Physical Activity and Health in the Department of Sport Science at Nottingham Trent University. This blog is based on Professor Cooper’s Inaugural Lecture “Move more, learn more? Unleashing the power of physical activity in schools”.