Mackeben students drop everything for ACES Day

Students and staff members at Mackeben Elementary School, Algonquin, recently participated in the annual ACES Day in which children from all 50 states exercised in unison for a minimum of 15 minutes.

The program called All Children Exercise Simultaneously (ACES) began in 1989 as a way to curb alarming rates of childhood obesity.

Similar to the drop everything and read program, students and staff dropped everything, exited the building, and walked around a track set up just for the ACES Day event. It was fun to see the entire school building empty out to enjoy 15 minutes of walking.

Held as an annual event, the purpose of ACES is to call attention to the importance of youth fitness in a fun, noncompetitive atmosphere. Physical Education teachers also use the program to encourage kids to incorporate regular exercise into their lives and adopt healthy diets.

Last year, more than 600 Illinois schools and an estimated 180,000 children, most in the USA, were creative in their participation in ACES. Some schools did aerobics, exercises, jogging, soccer, floor hockey, juggling, pickleball, badminton, bicycle riding, relay races, tennis, rope jumping, and more.