Those are the hoary physical education traditions, seemingly handed down from generation to generation.

Yet much truly has changed – evolved is more like it – in the modern middle school and high school PE class. Changed for the better, educators say, especially considering the nation's bloated rate of childhood obesity and alarming predictions about increases in juvenile-onset diabetes.

Gone is the epoch – in many secondary school programs, at least – when the teacher would just roll out the balls and tell kids to go play, when students would pick blades of grass in the outfield during softball "instruction," their heart rates barely rising about resting levels.

These days, you're more likely to find students checking the heart-rate monitors they've strapped on during jump rope to "stay in the zone," try for that aerobic threshold on the step trainer, and harden those abdominals and obliques with side planks.

Core training in middle school?

Abs-olutely.

Check out this scene from a recent seventh-grade PE class at Antelope Crossing Middle School in Antelope, Calif., which in 2008 was named one of four "star schools" in the nation, so designated by the National Association for Sport and Physical Education, or NASPE.

Twenty-five seventh-graders, fresh off a warm-up run, perform ab crunches with arms folded over their chests. Occasional groaning and bellyaching can be heard ("Owww, my stomach hurrrrts!"), to which teacher Laurel Whaley good-naturedly replies, "Oh, come on. Groaning makes you strong."

Over on the next patch of blacktop, teacher Meghan Jinguji presides over push-ups ("Good pushes from the knees are better than bad ones from the toes") followed by high-knee strides and lateral movement.

And around the corner, a boombox is blaring Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and the Romantics' "What I Like About You" as the students sweat it out on circuit training. The music might be straight out of the '80s, but the activity is state of the art: one-minute rotations on a variety of aerobic and strength-training stations, from step platforms to resistance bands to biceps curls.

After 25 minutes, teacher Brian Willey gathers the class on a blustery morning.

"You're sweating a little bit," he says, "that's a good thing. OK, so what was one component of fitness we worked on here?"

Hands shoot up.

"Cardiovascular endurance," one boy says.

Willey: "What's one station that did that?"

"The ladder," another student replies.

As its designation as a national award-winning program attests, Antelope Crossing is on the cutting edge of the latest trend in elementary and secondary school physical education principles: to engage students into lifelong physical activity and educate them on the proper form, function and philosophy of a variety of skills in individual and team sports as well as understand concepts such as optimal heart rate and effort for aerobic activity.

In simpler terms, the kids actually do something in PE and learn fitness skills they can carry to adulthood.

Case in point, says teacher Jinguji: "The (heart rate) monitors help our sixth-graders learn how to pace themselves. The way most come in doing a (mile) run is to start at high intensity, then recover, then sprint, walk, sprint, walk. When they have the monitor on, they can actually see how it's better to pace themselves. They see the graph and it connects the dots for them."

That's a far cry, indeed, from the days when the most strenuous thing a PE student did was line up for roll call.

California physical educators in 2006 adopted content standards that address the skills, concepts and measures needed by students in each grade level. Seventh-graders must master how to assess their muscle strength, endurance, aerobic capacity and body composition. They work with a teacher to set up a weekly personal fitness program and perform "moderate to vigorous" physical activity at least four days a week.

That's in addition, of course, to the 200 minutes of PE every two weeks from grades one to six, and 400 minutes every two weeks for grades seven to 12 that have long been part of the state's education code.

Still, if your child doesn't know aerobic from Abercrombie & Fitch, don't be surprised.

Many schools have been slow to implement the standards that the state Board of Education developed for physical education in 2006. And because PE is not part of the Academic Performance Index (i.e., standardized testing), there is no oversight or penalty for not reaching goals.

Dianne Wilson-Graham, former California president of the American Alliance for Physical Education, Recreation and Dance, has been a close observer of physical education curriculum. She says schools are all over the map when it comes to compliance.

Lack of funding and commitment by school districts is one factor for the lag, she says. But she also puts the blame on many physical educators who cling to the old way of teaching.

"We still have folks who are tied to what they did in 1968," Wilson-Graham says. "My joke to them always is, 'When I was in seventh grade, we didn't have microwave ovens. Do you have one in your house now?' We have to get the public to understand there are dramatic changes happening and help our school decision-makers understand that, too."

Antelope's Jinguji, who is a vice president of the American Alliance for Physical Education, Recreation and Dance's California chapter, has served as an evaluator of student PE teachers and also does outside work helping teachers with professional development.

The goal, she says, is for teachers to develop "physically literate individuals" by the time they leave high school.

Most PE classes still focus on team sports "requiring sporadic and/or limited physical activity," according to a recent report from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The report states that adding "lifestyle activities," such as running, weightlifting and personalized fitness programs, would better serve students.

Moreover, a 2006 NASPE "Shape of the Nation" report on school PE calls school requirements "weak." Jacalyn Lund, NAPSE president, said "a vast array of 'loopholes' such as exemptions, waivers and online classes too often eradicate those minimum standards at the local level at a time when more and more children are obese ..."

The CDC reports that 73 percent of high school students fail to attain minimum levels of physical activity to maintain health by the time they graduate.

Those out-of-shape teens often become sedentary adults, educators say. The key is to instill the habit and, yes, even a love of physical activity before it's too late. Few California elementary schools provide PE specialists, which is why the middle-school years are so important.

"It's a struggle, because you're always going to run into kids more and less motivated," says Zachary Lovell, a PE teacher at Arden Middle School in Sacramento. If you give kids the basic movement skills to apply through a variety of activities, they'll feel more competent when they get older.

"Using heart-rate (monitors) and pedometers to measure makes them understand the difference between aerobic and anaerobic exercise. As they get older, if they think they're interested in running a 5K or half-marathon, they'll understand the specificity of the training."

Some elementary schools in Placer County have, in essence, outsourced PE by using the nonprofit Running School Inc., headed by former pro triathlete Brad Kearns. Kearns and crew serve as de facto coaches for the students, preparing them for the "Fitnessgram," an age-graded test to determine levels of fitness.

This year, at First Street Elementary School in Lincoln, 90 percent of the students attained the Fitnessgram standard after working with Running School Inc. staff members, Kearns says.

At Antelope Crossing, Jinguji stresses the education component as much as the activity level.

All Antelope Crossing, seventh-graders turn in a bulky fitness portfolio, which includes printouts of their fitness scores, body mass index (BMI), graphs of heart-rate fluctuations in different activities, and appraisals of their nutrition intake, stress and body weight.

Eighth-graders concentrate mostly on team sports, but they also must pick a "lifetime" sport and conduct research on where opportunities to play exist.

The emphasis on team sports is one area that's been a constant in school PE over the years. During a street hockey game at Antelope Crossing, several players stood in place a lot, simply watching the puck being slapped around.

Jinguji, though, defends the use of team sports for eighth-graders. And, she says, they do cardio and warm-up before commencing games.

"We make sure they are small-sided games," she says. "Some research out there says you should never have more than six on a side, for maximum participation and lots of movement. There's never a lot of standing around. We have three soccer fields and play across the width of the fields."

And while she admits that once the students become adults, it's unlikely they will continue in team sports, "We philosophically believe that the more skills you have, the more likely you'll be able to pursue a lifetime physical activity because you'll be a better mover. We teach concepts that cross over."

Students at Antelope Crossing are thinking of the future, though. Some say they "endure" PE; others like being physical and realize they need to get in shape.

"It's a good workout," says Kavion Pickett, a seventh-grader with sweat beading on his forehead after vigorous rope jumping. "I need to lose some weight. My whole family does. This seems like a good way to do it."

Complaints during crunches notwithstanding, the level of participation at the school is impressive.

"I mean, I've never liked PE," says seventh-grader Lorena Balic, "but they make it good. It's challenging but not like you work until you die."

Then there's sixth-grader Nick Risinger, who has an entirely different reason for looking forward to PE.

"I've been grounded at home," he says, sheepishly, "so it's nice just to be outside."