What an amazing way to wrap up PE 320! Cheryl, Elizabeth, Jennifer and Rob pulled off the most intricate physical literacy lesson. I believe there was over 16 stations with various activities and levels of engagement. I really enjoyed the free-play nature of this lesson. Being able to engage with different stations and tasks and move on as you please was wonderful. I enjoyed that there were multiple stations that weren’t being used so you could always move along without having to take turns and wait. The lesson was very well designed in this sense. I would have enjoyed travelling with a partner for a little more motivation to read and try some of the other activities. My favourite activities were those where I got to colour a flower with motivational phrases, the meditation station and the goal making template. For me, I was always the type of PE student who preferred to participate in sports so it was nice to challenge myself by doing more low key activities. I can see how this lesson was designed for all learners. Although this lesson seemed like a lot to organize,  most activities were quite simple to coordinate and doing it over the course of a few weeks would be worth the effort. The group had put a lot of thought into aspects of the lesson from the tic-tac-toe organizer that encouraged movement to stations and the way they approached us during the lesson and encouraged us to challenge ourselves and stay on-task.

I have to say I had the best time delivering our dance lesson. The energy and fun the students brought to the class made it a wonderful and memorable experience. When I first saw the Youtube example of the whip nae-nae dance, I knew it would be a familiar song to the class and they’d have fun with it. The moves from the youtube example were an appropriate level for grade 2/3’s and for our 320 class to learn in one lesson. This was a worry when designing the lesson, that a dance routine would be difficult to teach and for students to memorize in twenty minutes.

Our group strategically chose the popcorn dance as our warm-up, we wanted students to get outside of their comfort zone and use ribbons and free movement to express themselves. The aspect of the lesson that I was most uncomfortable with was the chapter summary. I have often found this aspect of our lessons to be dry and its difficult to include many chapters worth of information in the short time we have. From attending a Kids Can Move workshop, I learned a game where the movements could be adapted to match the movements of the dance. The game with the four animals movements acted as scaffolding for the moves in the dance, in this way we wanted to make the dance accessible for all skill levels. Part of our chapter summary was on the use of technology in the PE classroom, considering this we utilized a wireless headset so that I could lead the dance with the music playing. Although it didn’t fit my head right and was a bit inconvenient, the benefits of clear instruction did more for our lesson. I’ll consider using this type of technology next time I teach a noisy PE lesson. Overall this experience was fantastic. I love the supportive nature of our cohort!

This week we explored different teaching methods in P.E. I was glad to get a better understanding of some theories through our group discussion. Steve was able to join our discussion and explain the idea of class-run sports organizations with students being involved in various roles such as head-coach, equipment manager, and media relations. I understood that it would take some time to organize the unit so that each student is contributing but I think it would be a great opportunity to bring PE into the classroom.

I thought the group that presented provided a brilliant modelling of the Teaching Games for Understanding method. Rather than immediately immersing us in the objectives and rules of the invasion game, their group set up more simplified activities that allowed us to build upon our skills and knowledge to better strategize in the end. During my practicum this week I encountered a volleyball lesson that could have benefitted from using this progression method. In my observation, groups of 6 children were asked to volley a volleyball and make 30 touches. I found that some individuals didn’t have a strong sense of the movements for bumping or setting, these students were not motivated to play and their teammates were avoiding passing the ball in their direction. With stations focusing on skill progression this lesson could have gone smoother and ended with the 30-touch activity. I think this team teach lesson has had the most impact on my teaching style. It ties in the theories of the Zone of Proximal Development, meeting kids where their at developmentally and giving them the tools to practice skills, and then test what they’ve learned with a challenge. Fridays class was a job will done and a great application of course themes!