Near Reims, bike-offices to help children concentrate

For the start of the 2022 school year, the private school Sainte-Anne de Charleville-Mézières has five bike-offices, a concept straight out of Canada. These are raised desks with pedals designed so that children can work and pedal at the same time. This new equipment aims to improve the concentration of students. This initiative, sometimes presented as an alternative to punishment, has already emerged in other establishments in France.

In this school, all classes from CE2 are equipped with office bikes. Teachers are aware that children naturally need to be on the move, hence the need to channel and redirect this excess energy. “When we have too much energy, we will tend to dissipate, to look right and left. There precisely by pedaling, the energy passes through the body and it allows children to concentrate better“, Explain Élodie Futrzynski, teacher in the classes of CM1 and CM2.

Office bikes allow children to let off steam and then better manage their emotions and be calmer. “It helps me concentrate more easily because when I have energy, I talk, sometimes I look everywhere“, says Jules. Rules of use have been put in place by the teachers: it is the most dissipated students who are designated to use the bike-office.

The school has also provided students with noise-canceling headphones for concentration and anti-stress rubber bands at the foot of the desks.