CHARLESTON, W.Va. – State officials have spent $90,000 on 286 new video game systems in the hope the machines can be used to motivate 21st century schoolchildren to exercise.
The state Department of Health and Human Resources provided the grant to the state Department of Education to purchase new Xbox 360 Kinect systems, said Melanie Purkey, director of the education department’s Office for Healthy Schools.
The systems will be used to help bolster physical education and health classes throughout the state, Purkey said. Players use their own body movement to control the video games, a method Purkey and others believe can help improve student health.
“It all adds up to more minutes of physical activity,” she said.
