Physical activity among children has been a topical subject in social debate in recent years. This often concerns children’s increasing sedentary behavior and the consequences that can lead to. In this debate education has been given a prominent position wherein children’s physical activity often is seen as a way for improved academic school-performance and health. The Swedish school-system is governed by policy, shaped by negotiations between different actors as politicians, public authorities, researchers and persons active in education. These actors are most probably influenced by different social forces that in turn convey varying knowledge, norms and values.

In this paper the interest is pointed at international actors with purpose to influence the content of educational police, explicit policy concerning children’s physical activity that takes place before and after compulsory school (e.g. school-age educare), during school-breaks and other school-subjects than sports and health. These prominent policy-actors are the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The aim of this paper is to investigate how children and their physical activity are constructed in official documents produced by WHO and OECD.

This paper draws from an ongoing PhD-project focusing on discourses in relation to children’s physical activity in Swedish school-age educare and school. Two documents were analyzed with inspiration from critical discourse analysis (that is the theoretical standpoint).

The result shows that children are constructed as potentially sedentary, overweight, and costly. According to the analyzed texts this problem should be solved within education by regulated, mostly sporting, physical activity. The analysis illuminates a discourse of public health within knowledge, norms and values of nature science and sporting is recontextualized in education, mostly for economic gain. This phenomenon might lead to a rather instrumental view on children and a reorganization of education. In the paper it is argued for a more humanity view on children and their physical activity in education. The author suggests a possible discourse of democracy within children´s voices should be heard and that concepts as influence and participation are given a prominent position when educational policy is produced.