The backpack should be a backpack and not a drag bag

The first school days are behind us, but many parents are wondering how children and young people will be able to carry so many notebooks, workbooks, books, textbooks, and supplies for school and extracurricular activities. The load is very heavy, and if children carry their backpack incorrectly on top of that, they cause additional damage to their bodies. With the help of mountaineering knowledge and years of experience using backpacks in the mountains, we answer two questions - how to properly choose a good backpack and how to use it correctly:



We cannot imagine mountaineering without a backpack, a mountaineering item similar to a bag with shoulder straps for carrying load on the back. Every experienced mountaineer will tell you that it is great fortune to have a comfortable backpack selected and adjusted to one's own measurements. Only such a one strengthens us with its evenly distributed load weight in pure effort.



Precisely the backpack, due to its practicality (it allows us to have free hands), wide range of uses (school use, sports training, daily shopping ...) and price accessibility, has in large numbers taken over the role and tasks of the school bag. And if anywhere, then every day on the street we can observe that these school backpacks are too heavy and far too often not adapted to the child's torso, so they arrive at and leave school with so-called drag bags. "School backpacks, almost down to that rear end, are dragged in soft body shuffling to the main break," Ula Furlan vividly described the drag bags in one of the media recently.



Given that wishes, needs, and perceptions of backpacks vary (not to mention the amount available for purchase), the question arises: how to choose one that will optimally satisfy our needs? In mountaineering, it is said that the backpack is a complex differential equation formed by four interdependent factors: purpose, shape, volume, and the ability to adjust the load to the torso.



The first factor in selection is the predominant lowland form of use: school, sports activities, or store shopping. If buying a backpack for school, where we mainly carry sharp-edged books and supplies every day, then it must differ from the one in which we will carry swimsuits and towels. Above all, it must have a sturdier back panel and bottom, made of thicker fabric that will also hold back weather moisture.



The next factor is the body height of the child or adolescent - the height of the backpack depends on the length of their torso. People of the same body height can have very long legs and short torso (they need a lower backpack) or short legs and long torso (their backpack can be higher). A truly excellent backpack adapts well to the hips, shoulders, and back, thus easing the efforts of walking and carrying. Therefore, we must pay special attention to the parts of the backpack that come into direct contact with the body. These are the shoulder straps, hip belt, and back panel. The shoulder straps should lie wide on the shoulders, as they must not pull back, touch the neck, or cut into the skin. We achieve this with relief straps on the shoulders and hips. Tension straps prevent the backpack from swinging left and right. The backpack must be fully adjusted to the carrier, and we must not just bring it from the store, fill it with contents, and use it.



The bulk of the weight (for children, the backpack weight should not exceed one tenth of their body weight) is transferred from the shoulders to the hips. In correct backpack adjustment, the hip belt must take over and distribute two-thirds of the weight across the center of the pelvis. Therefore, when personally adjusting the backpack, we must always first fasten the hip belt. Only the remaining weight (i.e., approximately one third) should actively "rest" on the shoulders, while the buttocks must remain unloaded. Otherwise, the backpack becomes a drag bag.



The weight of the backpack, especially if carried to school and back every day, is also decisive for spinal health and correct posture. Particularly sensitive is the period of accelerated and rapid growth in children and adolescents between 6 and 12 years of age. It is precisely in this age period that improper body positions often occur due to prolonged sitting (e.g., in school desks or in front of a computer and TV), overloads from too heavy school bags or carrying sports equipment load on one shoulder, as well as improper nutrition and insufficient physical activity. This year, around 160,000 children and adolescents attend Slovenian primary schools, and posture problems affect 14.2% to 15.9% of examined primary school students in systematic check-ups. Taking the lower - optimistic - limit, more than 22,700 children thus have various spinal problems.



Given everything said, it is clear what a good and suitable backpack is. However, children's eyes have their own perception. They fixate on something cute, colorful, and modern. If we as parents succeed in following the principle that we are not so rich as to buy cheap, we have done much - both for children's health and for the community in which we live.



Prepared by Borut Peršolja