It’s not surprising that Dover Public Schools faculty member Dani Wood has a natural understanding of the connection between physical activity and learning.

Wood serves as Dover’s special education director, elementary physical education teacher, elementary and middle school softball and girls’ basketball coach and assistant coach at the high school for the same sports.

And she operates her own home-based T-shirt design company.

And she is the mother of four children, ranging in age from 21 months to 19 years.

“Slow” and “stop” are not in her vocabulary.

And neither is the phrase “either-or” when it comes to choosing between classroom instruction and physical activity as higher priorities for public schools.

“Kids need both to be successful learners,” she said.

And that’s not just Wood talking. The Center for Disease Control has found positive associations between school-based physical activity and academic achievement and cognitive skills.

“Over the last 10-15 years and with more focus on testing, we’ve transitioned away from that idea,” she said. “Schools have reduced recess time and even eliminated it in some cases.

“Studies have shown that students lose their ability to think outside the box if you take play away.”

Wood knows a little bit about out-of-the-box thinking.

That’s how she managed to pull in more than $60,000 in public and private grant funds in her first year at Dover to help finance the kind of active learning environment where kids at all skill levels can achieve their full potential.

It’s a skill she learned at her previous post at Cimarron, where the entire PE equipment inventory consisted of exactly six dodge balls when she was hired.

“I started with a grant from Lowe’s to build a storage room and then applied for other grants to fill it up,” she said.

At Dover, she started a morning Marathon Kids walking club, where students who eat breakfast at school can follow it up with a few laps around the gym before classes start.

That might be boring, except that Wood got out her grant-writing pen and added bluetooth speakers so students can walk to music, and also prizes, like cool athletic gear, for walkers who achieve certain distance milestones.

Another grant funded a “Ride for Focus” program, which includes bikes that students can ride around the school campus.

An American Heart Association grant added more gym equipment, like jump ropes and five-gallon buckets that become improvised drums for rhythmic workouts.

And most recently, a grant through the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust outfitted an active learning lab, where children can drill on basic reading, spelling and math concepts while teetering on balance boards, riding stationary bikes and a myriad of other activities.

It’s a concept that Wood’s special needs kids especially respond to, but all students benefit.

“You get them moving and they don’t even realize they’re learning,” she said.

Dover Superintendent Max Thomas couldn’t be more pleased with Wood’s efforts on the district’s behalf, noting she’s the perfect example of Dover’s administrative philosophy.

“We hire talented people, take away their ceiling and then get out of the way and let them do what they do best,” Thomas said.