“Are you wondering why recess has just gone by in a snap of your fingers?”

That’s the question fifth graders at Seattle’s Thurgood Marshall Elementary posed in their school newspaper, The Bullpup Times, after new district scheduling requirements forced the school to shorten their daily recess.

Seattle Public Schools has tightened enforcement of instructional schedules, forcing some schools to reduce recess to 30 minutes daily — the minimum required by Washington state law .

Seattle Schools Superintendent Ben Shuldiner has defended the cuts as necessary for consistent academic instruction. But if a student submitted an argument that disregarded as much evidence as Shuldiner’s does, educators would send it back for revision.

Decades of scientific research have documented profound benefits of recess. A 2019 study of 728 elementary students found improved math scores after daily recess doubled from 15 to 30 minutes.…