My old man says he ‘never queues for food’. At Mamak, a great Malaysian eatery in Chinatown, he broke that rule the other day. It was worth it. At Teachers In Sport we – “don’t queue for sports”. We also don’t break our own rule.
Queuing for Sport
When I see children in line waiting for a turn in a sports lesson I cringe. Yes, it is an effective controlling mechanism. Yes, you may be the only one who can deliver a bowl, throw, serve or kick in a controlled enough manner to allow your students of sometimes limited ability to return, catch or hit the ball.
Is the control on multiple levels that you are achieving worth the passivity of the students who spend minutes at a time waiting in line?
We therefore bring you ‘Kids and Coaches’.
1) Relieve yourself of the ‘ball thrower’ duty and become the ‘Head Coach.’
2) Put the kids in pairs or groups of three.
3) Appoint one child as ‘coach’
a. Their job is to feed the ball in the way that you instruct (underarm throw to the forehand, a ground kick to the left of their team-mate etc).
b. Have them repeat this task ‘x’ times before they rotate the ‘kid and coach’ role.
4) While your class is performing the ‘kids and coaches’ style drill you are free to divide your time evenly, help the ‘kids’ with their technique – help the coaches with theirs (feeding a ball appropriately is a very useful skill). You will notice that some kids revel in the role as coach and will begin to perform basic analysis and correction on their ‘students’
5) The result? Everybody doing something, everybody doing more of the activity in less time and therefore everybody improving faster.
ENJOY!
Notes from the Sportsfield... 