The notion of incorporating physical literacy and outdoor education in the daily routine of students seems obvious to me. Planning a lesson that is both educational and inspirational to the children can happen outside. Throughout the reading I was thinking of my grade 10 to grade 12 Gym teacher, Mr. Ray, who was both a coach and a mentor to me.
Mr. Ray, in conjunction with being the gym teacher, he was also my soccer and snowboarding coach. The reading emphases the differences and similarities between the roles a physical educator can take on for the class. I admire to be a physical educator who encourages students to become physically active, which means so much more than participating in sports. A great educator can focus on the fundamental movement skills and incorporate those into any environment or subject matter.
Congratulations to Jackie, Brianna, Katy, and Lexi for an amazing outdoor education class. Your directions were clear and direct (which in an alternative environment can be hard) and the lesson ran perfectly. During my time in Katy’s air station we observed a HUGE spider catch, spin, and eat a fly. By far the coolest thing I have scene in awhile. After observing the spider we discussed how we could incorporate that experience into a science or math project. The options for cross-ciricular learning are endless.
It’s true that taking your students outside seems like a obvious activity to do, and do often, however this weeks group proved the amount of work a teacher needs to have prepped in order to pull off a flawless lesson. I think of the hardest part of creating a lesson outside, next to environment, is creating a lesson that will appeal to all students. Because of the amount of stimuli surrounding students in the outdoors setting it is important that your activity is either more interesting than, or inclusive of, the external environment. I think the best way for this is by creating a central goal as this weeks group did in the instant activity; where every student must participate at their own pace.
The workshop/classroom activity was a success without question. The flexibility in which this weeks group worked was staggering. The preparation and improvisation the group used on situations such as; dealing with wind at Jackie’s art station, encountering a “downed” balloon at Brianna’s station, or even witnessing a fly’s final destination at Katy’s station, was nothing short of amazing.
As most of the class taught lessons have been, this weeks group did a great job in terms of making their lesson related to the discussion and readings. The group followed the 6 key communication tools during instruction presenting clearly, with demonstrations, observation and feedback. I look forward to using these strategies in my teacher career.