BAY MINETTE — How do you get kids to run an obstacle course in the pouring rain — willingly — without having your teaching methods questioned?

Jamie McGowin, a physical education teacher at Bay Minette Elementary School, said it’s easier than you might think.

As many as 30 BMES students at once can now participate in an array of physical activities, designed specifically for children, as part of the “Wee Can Fight Obesity” program.

McGowin traveled in late February to the Alabama Sports Festival building in Montgomery to receive training alongside a handful of other teachers and principals on the Nintendo Wii Fit Plus Bundle.

One month later, the gym comes alive when third-grade students get their turns using a variety of gaming software designed to not only establish lifelong habits of physical activity, but to also assist teachers in monitoring students’ progress getting fit and, in some cases, losing weight.

A recent U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study revealed Alabama falls among the five least physically active states in the nation.

“It’s an amazing program, and the kids absolutely love it,” said McGowin, noting the obstacle course program is the overall favorite among her students.

In smaller groups, female students tend to prefer the hoola hoop function and the boys are surprisingly adept with the dancing game, she said.

“So many kids today go home in the afternoons and head straight for the computer. They just don’t get the same amount of exercise their parents did when they were kids, and this is a problem,” McGowin said. “This program is designed to get them moving, and it works.”

The annual health-rankings report released jointly on Wednesday by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation revealed Baldwin County remains the third-healthiest county in the state for the second consecutive year, but neighboring Mobile County slipped four spots to 46th of 67 counties.

The study ranks every county in the nation based on analysis of obesity and high school graduation rates and well as air pollution levels and access to health care services.

According to the study, one in eight residents surveyed reported being in fair or poor health, averaging 3.4 poor “physical” heath days and 4.1 poor “mental”-health days in the prior month.

Those trends can improve even further, McGowin said, if students are taught from a very early age that physical activity doesn’t have to be viewed as a chore.

Of course, students could also easily pick up an actual hoola hoop or dance entirely on their own, she said, but the motion-based gaming program builds in a competitive component that motivates students to keep pushing well past where they might on their own.

“They see those scores climbing, and they want to keep going,” McGowin said.

The statewide program targeting third-graders specifically is administered by the Alabama Sports Festival, the Alabama State University Physical Education’s health and recreation department, the Alabama State Department of Education and the Governor's Commission on Physical Fitness.

Click the link below to see BMES students in action.