How are you effectively and conservatively using your backpack? Upon asking yourself this question, you probably have either one of two mindsets. The first mindset is the thinking that you use your bag taking advantage of the fact that it’s great for cramming all the things inside your locker into, including puffy jackets. It’s really heavy, but you don’t mind carrying a turtle’s back onto the bus. The second mindset, is the thinking that you really couldn’t care less about what you carry everyday. You only need to stuff a few things in your backpack, though still enough for a reasonably heavy backpack, and without thinking, you sling it over one shoulder and hobble onto the bus. Even though you can probably identify which kind of person you are, or maybe you’re a mix, you probably don’t realize that both mindsets lead different routes to the same dilemma- as you get more and more into the school year, your heavy or improperly worn backpack is simultaneously taking a toll on your health, one school day at a time.
What do you think the percentage of weight students carry on their backs is in both the mornings and afternoons, in comparison to their own weight? Is this something you’ve ever stopped to consider? Is it something you don’t have time to think about? Or is it something you simply don’t care about? Regardless of your case, you probably should be aware that the average recommended amount of weight that a student should carry at one time is 15% of their own weight. But in reality, according to several sources, about 30% of middle schoolers carry approximately one- third of their weight on their backs, and 60% (⅔ ) report back pain, of which about one- fifth report it chronically for an entire school year. What that means, proves the fact that around 5,000 children in local areas around and outside the US find themselves in the emergency room for backpack-caused issues. Because those statistics may overwhelm you, it’s helpful to know the symptoms that can indicate whether or not you are a victim of this harmfulness. Improperly worn backpacks lead to injured muscles and joints and can contribute to severe back, neck, and shoulder pain, as well as posture problems. Experience of any kind of these pains without other possible sources probably indicates problems due to the weight of your backpack. If you can see red marks from your bag’s straps digging into your shoulder muscles, your bag’s weight is pushing the boundaries. And finally, if you experience parts of your body “falling asleep” while you carry your bag, it’s going into the negative limit too.
It’s time you seriously consider making a difference in what you put into your backpack when you get ready to get onto the bus in both the mornings and afternoons. After all, what else can really be in your backpack in the first place that makes it so heavy in proportion to your weight? Whether you have incentive to or not, part of limiting the weight on your shoulder requires logic, more specifically the ability to take advantage of all the places you can put your school materials. You can’t ignore all those storage areas; you can store things at home, you can fit so many things in your locker, and the remaining few things you actually need should easily fit into your backpack. A big rule of thumb should be to only take what you really need. Consider the fact that in this modern world, most of your assignments traveling between school and home are on your Chromebook- your Google account, which can be accessed several ways- not necessarily by cramming all study material that are online into your poor backpack. In addition, if you’re like most students, you find it impossible to get to every single homework assignment done if it isn’t due the following day. So what’s the point of taking home those papers? If you want to reassure yourself that you aren’t forgetting anything, and as a result take home several big binders every night, you should be aware of and take advantage of your FLEX period. It’s meant to get a head start on your homework, but that doesn’t mean you can’t prioritize and organize your work too. Becoming a successful student is part being able to manage your time. So you get bonuses for spending FLEX productively, which only helps yourself. And if you’re the kind of person who doesn’t like to carry anything else other than your backpack, besides an occasional instrument, and stuff your lunchbox and jacket into your backpack, you should realize two things. One, why do you have a jacket if you won’t wear it? And two, why is it that it’s so hard to carry a lunchbox, considering it has a handle? It isn’t impossible to carry two extra things, especially things that would be lighter if they weren’t adding excessive weight to your bag.
In addition to the obvious; not taking what you inevitably won’t use, and generally watching what goes into your backpack, the way you wear your backpack can also conserve your healthy body. Most kids, as I stated earlier, don’t care at all about the way their backpacks are slung over their shoulders, and just let the weight drag them down. But, precisely speaking, the way you wear your backpack should take advantage of both straps, it should have minimal space between the bag and your back, and it should hang two inches below the waist. Regarding the backpack itself, it should be approximately the length of the torso of a person, made of lightweight fabric. This way, the joints and muscles in the shoulders won’t tighten, bio-mechanics of moving won’t be altered, and posture and walking habits won’t be adjusted, perhaps permanently. Eventually, greater effects include sore hips from pressure compensation, and ligaments in body tissue will break. Logically distributing the weight requires taking advantage of all compartments in your backpack, to balance out the amount of shoulder, knees, back, and waist muscles incorporated in successfully carrying a backpack. This doesn’t necessarily alter the “bare necessities” you put into your bag, but nonetheless slows down the tolls it takes on your health.
Shockingly, about eighty million children in Kindergarten through twelfth grade carry backpacks daily. If you consider each of the students, big and small, of all personalities, wearing their backpacks improperly and overloading them each and every day and night, it’ll add to the pain children in general undergo, and the insufficient amount of sleep they get won’t be enough to repair the damage. So eventually, more students will need to be treated in hospitals for even more backpack related injuries, which is clearly unreasonable, considering how easily this can be avoided. And to think, if the effort and money the world spends on health, which supposedly should be for sensible cause, is used for such a cause like backpacks, how pitiful it would be. So we can start making a difference here at Grover. Big positive change isn’t an instant miracle, and we should recognize that small differences in our Caring Community include regard for ourselves, which can eventually spread into one of the Twenty-First Century Competencies, global awareness, because of one word- change.
Works Cited
- “Backpack Safety.” KidsHealth – the Web’s Most Visited Site about Children’s Health. The Nemours Foundation. Web. 19 Oct. 2016.
- By Stephanie Kraus with Reporting from TIME. “News.” Big Backpacks Equal Big Problems. Web. 19 Oct. 2016.
- Samakow, Jessica. “The Dangers Of Heavy Backpacks — And How Kids Can Wear Them Safely.” The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com. Web. 20 Oct. 2016.
- “Backpack Facts: What’s All the Flap About”. The American Occupational Therapy Association, Inc. pdf. 19 Oct. 2016
- “National School Backpack Awareness Day”. The American Occupational Therapy Association, Inc. html. 19 Oct. 2016
Grover Middle School's Jagazine 