Isabelle Auty, Elementary P.E. Teacher, helps lay a foundation of movement and fun

A chance to run, skip, juggle scarves, toss bean bags—P.E. class at Alpine Lakes Elementary (ALPS) and Peshastin Dryden Elementary (PD) is active learning, movement, and play, under the guidance of Isabelle Auty, a National Board Certified teacher in her second year in the Cascade School District (CSD). Auty sees every elementary class, 575 students in total, once a week, splitting her time at ALPS and PD.

The joyful, funny song “Raining Tacos” greeted a second-grade class on arrival at the gym one afternoon. To begin, the kids ran in circles, and with quick pauses in the music, Auty directed them to skip, crawl, and do slow rotations. The energy release was immediate, heart rates rose, and then students were able to settle into a sitting circle. The day’s fun would include Gotcha Tag and an outdoor relay. But first was a question, “What is sportsmanship?”

Answers included saying “good game” whether you win or lose and giving high fives. After each activity, Auty returned to her question, and the kids could elaborate further, saying sportsmanship means only saying “Gotcha” in tag if you really tag someone, helping someone if they fall down, and going all the way around the cone—no shortcutting—in a relay.

Gotcha tag achieved 100% participation; everyone was an “it,” armed with two bean bags to slide toward classmates’ feet. And “getting out” earned only a short stint of brain exercises like ten raised knee touches with the opposite hand. To go across the body from left hand to right knee builds the bridge between the two brain hemispheres, which allows for more complex movement and thinking, Auty explained.

Auty’s lessons are play-based, with physical and socioemotional fundamentals being taught at the same time. In the relay, Auty didn’t emphasize the winning team. No one even noticed because kids continued to tag each other for another leg of running or backward walking. For the final few minutes of P.E., Auty switched to a calming activity of juggling scarves. “Hold it out like a stinky sock,” she advised the class, adding the challenge of throwing and catching with the same hand rather than passing from hand to hand.

Her curriculum matches student development. Whereas PD students might work on throwing skills, ALPS students will use that foundation to learn the game of ultimate frisbee. This spring, with a fleet of new bikes at the schools, Auty will introduce a bike unit to all but the youngest grades. Students will practice maneuvering skills and rules of the road on the grass.

Auty taught middle schoolers for eight years, and now, teaching at elementary schools, she says, “There’s a contagious energy. Everything is fun, and they want to play.” Auty does a lot of role modeling, such as getting down for pushups with a student, which keeps her moving too, while feeding the students’ desire to learn and improve.

Auty has long known the value of physical activity; her father was a P.E. teacher. When she traveled the world on a sabbatical, SCUBA in Australia, skiing in Europe, and hiking to Everest Base Camp were part of her itinerary. She and her husband chose Leavenworth in large part because of the many ways to get outside with their four-year-old daughter, including introducing snowboarding and skiing to her at Ski Hill. Auty often bikes between the two schools, showing her students that sport and fitness can be part of everyone’s daily life.

“Typically, it takes a few years to feel at home’ in a new school, but Isabelle has jumped right in!” raved Emily Ross, PD principal. “Within Isabelle’s first year, she created field days for students, collaborated with teachers (everything from body spelling of letters to adjusting her schedule to support special education students), continued the tradition of Nordic skiing, and even went as far as allowing a jogathon top earner to cover her head with sardines during a celebration. 

“Her energy is contagious, her intentional teaching is supporting a new generation of students in laying a healthy foundation of movement and exercise into their lives, and her willingness to include all students regardless of behavior or need is felt by every student in the school. It’s been a pleasure to have her at PD!”