FITCHBURG, Mass. (AP) — Running, shouting and four square — all familiar sights and sounds for current and former students alike. It's recess and, for many children, the most anticipated time of the day.

But in some schools the time set aside for recess has strained under the pressures of state testing and discipline, according to state Rep. Marjorie Decker, D-Cambridge, who introduced state legislation on the topic earlier this year.

"We live in a world right now where, more than ever, I think people would say the ability to resolve conflict with each other is so essential," she said. "All the research shows there's nowhere better to learn this than the playground."

If passed, the bill she introduced to both the House and Senate would require schools to provide at least 20 minutes of recess a day for students in kindergarten through fifth grade.

Locally, many administrators are on board.

"I know my own kids, I would never want them to be in school without recess," said Patty Marquis, principal at Meetinghouse School and Westminster Elementary School. "I think there are many benefits."

Currently, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education does not have a statewide policy on recess aside from excluding the period from counting toward physical education requirements, according to a spokeswoman.

Decker said the issue arises when teachers and administrators, pressured to produce students who perform well on state testing, cut into the time set aside for recess. In other scenarios, taking away recess is used to punish students who act out, she said.

"I think there's a lot of pressure on our schools, and recess is an easy place to take it from," she said. Pressure, Decker said, she has heard from parents and teachers around the state.

In Leominster, Francis Drake School Principal Andres Vera agrees recess has benefits for the students in his school.

"Kids do need movement," he said. "There's a lot of research behind movement and learning."

But, if the bill gets written into law, it would mean some changes for Leominster. Besides Priest Street, which has a half-hour recess, students in the city's elementary schools are allotted 15 minutes a day for recess.

Vera believes while meeting the proposed recess requirement is doable, schools would have to balance it with other policies, such as the state minimum requirement for classroom hours.

He said this might put a strain on schools with fewer minutes of recess than Leominster.

"There's only so many minutes in the day," he said.

Fitting everything into the school day is difficult, agreed Fitchburg Superintendent Andre Ravenelle, but he believes his district's schools are in a "fine position" should the bill become law.

While it varies from school to school, most kindergarten through fifth-grade students in Fitchburg have 15 to 20 minutes of recess, which is separate from the time allotted for lunch. The sole exception is the fifth-graders at Memorial Middle School, who do not have recess.

As currently written, the bill specifies recess as "unstructured free-play," meaning any programs planned during that time wouldn't count toward the 20 minutes per day.

Ravenelle said he doesn't think this will interfere with any ongoing programs in the district. He added that recess, though unstructured, also contributes to "social emotional learning," a recent focus of the district.

"I think the fact that people are thinking about physical activity is a good thing," he said.

In Westminster, Marquis said even though the school has aides to watch the kids play, she and teachers often attend recess as well.

"We learn a lot from the kids by watching them at recess," she said. "We can observe sometimes and teach important social skill lessons. It's far more meaningful than working with a child on how to be a good friend in an office somewhere."

Though sometimes older students need to meet with teachers during recess, occasionally for behavioral problems, as an administrator she said she doesn't believe in taking recess away as a punishment. At Francis Drake, Vera said missing recess is used as a punishment only after consulting with the parents.

As for testing, students aren't held over during recess, except in the rare cases they want to continue, Marquis said.

"Some kids won't leave the test to go to recess," she said. "It's a very unusual thing, but once in a while you get some kids that just spend way too long on the test. They're really hyper-focused and they spend every minute they possibly can to do the best they can."

It's not just testing or discipline that affects recess, either. Sometimes it's the weather.

On sunny days the 20-minute recess at Ashby Elementary School can mean swinging, basketball or digging in the sandbox, Principal Anne Cromwell-Gapp said. When the weather turns bad and the wind chill drops, recess is playing board games inside.

But rain or shine, recess goes on, she said.

"I wish we could have more," Cromwell-Gapp said. "It's a long day to be in a building."