Beginnings of modernization of physical exercise in practice of Panama and Costa Rica

Abstract

The disorderly practice of physical exercise and sport in Central America began to be modernized at the beginning of the 20th century. In the beginning, physical exercise in that region was carried out without any scientific guidance and without taking into account the age and sex. With the professionalization and modernization of educational personnel in this educational area is that the above-mentioned activity goes from an emphasis on strength to the conception of a human ideal from the corporal point of view, where it stops concentrating only on the visible forms of the body and begins to take into account the internal organs and their functioning. The above is true for the Panamanian case. With regard to the Costa Rican case, the need to regulate the practice of gymnastics in the school system stands out, for which it was necessary to appoint a Director of Physical Education at a national level. In both cases the modernization of the practice of physical exercise and sport was led by feminist teachers, because in their ideology the woman had to raise her quality of life by performing this activity.