Abstract:

Human healthy living habits are influenced by socio-economic, cultural and environmental conditions, as well as a major influence is from the family and the individual personal habits. Improvement of the situation requires the development of an infrastructure which support physical activity. The main tasks of environmental design are to create an environment that supports physical activity, creates opportunities for the society to move physically and motivates individuals to engage in physical activities.

Pupils spend most of their time in school premises, which significantly reduces the amount of daily movements of pupils, as they are sitting for a long time in the classroom. This has a negative impact on pupils' physical and mental abilities. Educational institutions need to develop an infrastructure supporting physical activity during the learning process and at lessons’ breaks. By extending active design to the school environment, it needs to be carefully designed to create a safe and quality design. The specifics of the school environment are different from the wide public interiors, so the possibilities of active design, according to safety and peculiarities of the age of the pupils, should be evaluated. In existing schools, the environment needs to be adapted to the new features in order to provide opportunities for physical activity.

The aim of the article is to analyze the researches carried out on the possibilities of implementing active design in the school environment, to determine the factors influencing the physical activity of pupils in the school environment; to assess the current situation in secondary schools and identify possible improvements of existing environments to promote physical activity.

Research methods: theoretical - literature analysis, the empirical - students' questionnaire. 200 students from secondary schools are involved in the study.

The results of the survey confirm the correlation between total physical activity of the pupils and school environment that affect physical activities. Pupils show interest in changing the interior of the school that could promote physical activity (climbing walls, balance training equipment, zoned play ground, workout machined, etc.).

Keywords:

Active design, physical activity, school environment, survey.