Module 7:  Places and Spaces

Exploring Your Local Environment

These places may include:

• Rec Centers
• Gyms
• Courts
• Parks
• Fields
• Trails

Being Active Close to Home

A college student has many barriers to staying healthy and maintaining physical activity.

Your day is packed with coursework, homework, work and other educational commitments.  And there’s the time spent in sedentary leisure activities such as engaging with social media or hanging out with friends. It can be a challenge to reach the 300-minute target for moderate-intensity physical activity each week.

ActiveU can help you hit your weekly exercise goal by meeting your course step count requirements. If you don’t have larger blocks of time in your schedule, you can break your exercise into 10-minute increments.

The goal of this module is to help you identify places and spaces withina short distance of where you live that are accessible and inviting places to be active.

By accessible, we mean they are easy to get to by walking or cycling and are available for use without a paid membership.

By inviting, we mean these places and spaces have attractive qualities that make you want to experience them. You feel safe there. The facilities are clean and attractive and have features that allow you to be active in the way you prefer to exercise.

Knowing these venues are nearby might encourage you to take a quick break from studying or watching movies and get moving. They may also become places you go for longer periods to work out or play with friends.

Focus on others:  Good friends enhance your mental health and happiness, but these friendships don’tjust happen. Invite a friend or a group to join you in activities that can be done together. Feeling shy? Consider joining a club or group that meets regularly.

Places

Places are structures purposefully built to promote physical activity.

Indoors

• Health and fitness centers
• Recreation departments
• Gyms
• Indoor swimming pools
• Skating rinks
• Bowling alleys
• Rock climbing gyms
• Trampoline parks

 Outdoors

• Basketball courts
• Beach volleyball courts
• Skateboard parks
• Tennis/pickleball courts
• Disc golf courses
• Golf courses
• Playgrounds

Spaces

Spaces are areas in the community that can be used for physical activity.

Some may be specifically designed for activity, such as pathways or hiking/biking trails.

Others may be open fields, parks or waterways that could be used for play or sports. 

What activities can you do in public spaces?

• Walking
• Hiking
• Jogging
• Biking
• Skating
• Skiing
• Climbing
• Swimming
• Canoeing
• Kayaking
• Throw a frisbee
• Throw a football
• Yoga
• Individual or group exercise
• Social dance

Put it on your calendar:  A healthy balanced lifestyle benefits from planning time to exercise and unwind. Take a look at your schedule and pencil in some time with friends or time for yourself. You’ll have a better chance of making it happen if you plan for it.

Explore Virtually

Don’t know where these areas are? It’s not hard to find out.

Use Google Maps or other mapping apps to explore the area around where you live and where you study.

Most mapping apps have features that measure distances between points. You can also use the tool to create a radius around a central point.

Using the different map types (default or satellite) in combination can help you find places and spaces you didn’t know were close by.

Here’s an example:

1. Type in maps.google.com into any internet browser.
2. On the search tool at the top left, enter your apartment name, residence hall or other physical address.
3. Once you have it, you’ll see a pin. Use your mouse to center the screen on your pin.
4. Right-click on your mouse and an options box will appear. At the bottom is “measure distance.” Select this.
5. Move the very small black circle that appears to your starting point.
6. Click again on another point to create a second circle.
7. The distance between these points will now show.
8. You can hold and drag in a circle to see what places and spaces are within a pre-set distance.

Mindfulness Resources:  Just as your body needs to move and navigate through areas, your thoughts also need direction. Here are a few resources to get you started:

• themindfulnessapp.com
• stopbreathethink.com
• calm.com
• sanvello.com

Creating a Walking/Biking Route

The distance option described in the previous section gives you a guide to places and spaces within a specific radius of your home.

Although the direct path is not always the possible path, as it will travel through private areas, you can click anywhere on a line and reshape it to fit within specific open pathways. You can also make additional points to create a complete route. The total distance is given from the starting point as you create the map.

Active Opportunities

The real goal of exploring places and spaces in your immediate environment or on campus is to discover opportunities to be physically active.

While it’s obvious what you can do at places such as bowling alleys or swimming pools, this section takes you a step further. By opportunities, we mean situations that make it possible to do something you want to do.

At the bowling alley, there may be leagues that you could join as an individual or as a team with some friends. Some centers also have events to attract customers, such as “cosmic bowling” where the lights are off, the music is up and the balls and pins glow in the dark.

At the pool, there may be water aerobics classes you could join or swimming lessons available for those who want to learn this valuable life skill.

Time savers:  When you are running an errand, consider ways to combine that with another activity. These could include meeting friends to go bowling and then stopping for your groceries on the way home. Combining social activities with errands you were going to do anyway increases your productivity.

On-Campus Opportunities

While you are most likely aware of the recreation or wellness centers that exist on your campus, particularly their facilities — such as sports halls, weight rooms, running tracks and climbing walls — there may be hidden gems that you have not discovered.

Exercise classes and signature events

Although group fitness classes are often well advertised in these centers, look out for any signature events that occur throughout the year. These are one-off activities designed to promote campus spirit, connect the campus community and provide a healthy activity. Some of these have long traditions.

For example, Auburn University has an annual “Cake Race” during Homecoming Week. The race was established in 1928 by Wilbur Hutsell, the track coach at the time, and the first 25 to finish receive a home-baked cake. Other popular events are mud runs and color runs.

Check out your campus recreation website. You never know what you might find. For example, Rutgers University has an annual “Canoe Battleship” that allows students to play a real-life version of the popular children’s board game “Battleship.”

Teams of four have a canoe, two buckets and two kick-boards to defend them from incoming water. The last boat to stay afloat is the winner.

Intramurals

Most campus recreation departments offer intramural competitions. These may be ongoing leagues (such as softball, flag football and ultimate) or one-off tournaments (such as pickleball or bowling).

Both of these formats usually have a number of different divisions, so you can choose the level of competition that allows you (and your friends) to have the most enjoyable experience. For the ongoing leagues, you can create your team under the sport you wish to play and, once you have the minimum player requirement, select your league or division. In many universities, you may sign up for any sport as a “free agent” if you don’t have a team. Watch for teams that say “looking for players” and email the captains of those teams.

Outdoor adventures

Many recreation departments offer a variety of outdoor trips during semesters. These can range from day trips/clinics to weekend and week adventures. Activities may include rock climbing, canyoneering, mountain biking, whitewater and flatwater trips, backpacking and hiking. In the mountain and northern states, cross-country skiing, backcountry touring and ice climbing are included.

Bike shops and rideshare programs

Is your college a “Bike Friendly University”? There are over 200 colleges and universities across the United States that have bike share and rental programs. Further, many campus recreation departments have bike shops that offer a variety of free resources, tools and expertise to help you maintain and repair your bike.

Your Immediate Environment

As a college student, much of your day is spent sitting. You have classes and meetings to attend, you study, and then in your free time you often watch TV/videos or interact on the computer or your phone. As a result, the average college student spends over 10 hours a day sitting.

While attending class and studying are essential to college success, it is important to appreciate that the body reacts to sitting in a number of ways that are not particularly positive.  For example:

Did you Know?

As soon as you sit:

• electrical activity in the leg muscles shuts off
• calorie burning drops to 1 per minute
• enzymes that help break down fat drop 90%

After 2 hours:

• good cholesterol drops 20%

After 24 hours:

• insulin effectiveness drops 24%
• the risk of diabetes is significantly increase

Fortunately, studies have shown that getting 60 to 75 minutes of moderately intense physical activity a day can counter the effects of too much sitting. Reaching the ActiveU goals is a great way to counter excessive sitting.

Finding activity spaces in your apartment

Experts recommend that you take a break from sitting every 30 minutes.  Dieticians suggest taking a great way to take this break is through “activity snacks.” Activity snacks occur when you dedicate 5 minutes to be active in places where you are usually sitting. Others call this strategy “instant recess,” “brain boosters” or “energizers.”

These activity breaks have shown to be particularly helpful. They require no set-up, no transfer to another place and take little time. In other words, they are perfect for when you find yourself sitting for extended periods in your dorm, apartment or house.

The challenge is to find suitable areas within your living quarters where you can carry out some simple exercises.

Consider scouting out these spaces and places:

• a rug or carpeted area where you can do some exercises on the floor
• a stable chair where you can do some form of dips or modified push-ups
• a sturdy wall to try some wall sits
• a space where you can do some vigorous exercises such as mountain climbers, burpees or jumping jacks
• stairs within your actual apartment or between floors of the building
• an open space where you can move and dance

Summary

The goal of this module was to help you become aware of the places and spaces close to where you live that are opportunities for physical activity. These may be accessible by walking or cycling, which adds to your daily activity count.

We hope you have discovered new accessible and inviting venues that will help you reach your activity goals.

We also hope you have discovered activity opportunities in the space directly around where you live. Because college students on average can spend up to 10 hours a day sitting, exploring spaces where you can take “activity snacks” or an “instant recess” is a worthwhile exercise.

References

Moulin, M. S., Truelove, S., Burke, S. M., & Irwin, J. D. (2021).
Sedentary time among undergraduate students: A systematic review.
Journal of American College Health, 69(3), 237-244.

You have reached the end of Module 7. Please complete the Assessment.