Placement Day 11 (a teacher training day)

18/2/13

This was a teacher training day and PE teacher A thought it may be a useful day for me to see what it’s like for teachers to teach things like phonics, and there was also going to be an emphasis on physical activities.

Literature and Phonics

The first session of the day was about teaching phonics to special needs children. A majority of this session was centered around useful resources for special needs teachers that were available for teaching phonics and reading etc. One particular resource was the Bug Club books and online activities. The Bug Club aims to help special needs students to understand phonics and learn how to read using picture books and comics. I was quite surprised to hear about comics being included, but I was told that some students will reach a certain age when they are not happy to read a picture book that appears as though it is aimed at children. However, special needs students i.e. teenagers who at that age who don’t think it’s appropriate to read picture books do not alway possess the level of reading required for a usual comic. So bodies like Bug Club aim to present stories as comics, so they can be appropriate for older audiences, but still have a lower level of reading so that the students can learn at a steady pace. This is something that appealed to me and my idea of story games, picture books for special needs audiences who can learn how to play physically demanding games and activities. A comic style could come in handy for older students when it comes to trying these ideas out. Famous characters and icons were also discussed, and about how they were being implemented in some books to be recognised and help influence student interest. This is a them that I have been integrating into my project, using superheroes like spiderman to create fun and innovative tasks for the students. I was pleased to see ideas like these had been known to work elsewhere in schools.

The session also covered the Bug Club website and how it uses online cartoons and games for the same purposes. Many special needs students enjoy and benefit greatly from the use of modern technology in the classroom, and Bug Club provided their resources in a visual and fun way on their site. The use of games and digital images on the web seemed like a brilliant idea because this is something students could access at any time and enjoy having their literary work come to life. This also influenced my ideas, making me think that perhaps one day my story games ideas could evolve into cd’s or dvd games were digital images, cartoons and useful demonstrations could be used to get students excited about physical activity at home as well as in schools. In theory the idea seemed potentially effective, but how would I muster finances for cd and dvd production?

The Special Olympics

The Special Olympics is the third official leg of the Olympic games; unlike their brothers, the Special Olympics is for a range of abilities rather than the top 5% performers in a field. The Special Olympics provides motivation for any person with special needs, giving a systematic structure that allows people to train hard before the main events, though it’s more like therapy as all tasks will make a change to a persons daily living skills. The Special Olympics will be held in Bath in August and will be using our school to help host the events and provide support.

The leaders of this session got us all working in groups after explaining how the Special Olympics works and provided us with fictional characters to see if we could get them to perform a physical task. The characters each had a profile, stating if they were paralyzed on one side or from the waist down, if they had any visual impairment, speech impairment, any preference to colours and so on. The physical tasks were generally simple, for example our character was to hit a ball off a stump with a racket. It was the differentiation and progression that we had to pay close attention to; if they didn’t like the task or if they were particularly good at that task how could they move on? Our group thought of placing visual markers for where the ball landed and encouraging the student to hit it further than the marker, or we thought of training his swing in different directions to see if that would help his control during a forehand swing. All these meticulous elements make the difference to a special needs person and to anyone who trains in physical activity. So practicing them today with the other teachers was a refreshing exercise for me.

Live life to the full.

Steve.

Placement Day 10

6/2/13

Today was originally intended as my last day of the project. However I had spent much more time observing the students and getting involved in a school routine to better understand the children and their needs. As a result I have not felt able to implement as many lesson plans as I had hoped to do. But is is with delight that I can now tell you that the staff have welcomed me to stay longer on my placement project for as long as I like. The head of the primary department said to me "it's a great idea to stay longer because that gives you the chance to really develop a relationship with the kids and that's when you can really make a difference."

I spent this day with the two supply teachers, A and B, I had been with in the past.

Lesson 1 - Class B

Supply teacher A had planned to practice some basketball skills with this group, which I agreed may be a nice change for them. Supply teacher A started by getting the students to use the basketball to perform some simple dynamic stretches, including moving the ball around the body to warm up hips and core, tricep stretches, and moving the ball under the leg; I enjoyed seeing this creative form of a warm up, as I’ve been taught to use some basic dynamic stretches when training for my diploma, but using the equipment in this way seemed to be a clever and relevant way of warming up.

Supply teacher A then put the groups into pairs, including myself, which were set up in two lines across the hall, facing each other. We began by simply bouncing the ball to one another; most students in this class coped well with this and many of them actually appeared frustrated due to the lack of activity involved. We then moved on to a chest pass, a throw without the use of a bounce. Again I couldn’t help but realise that the students in this class are very able, and although I thought this was fine as an activity in itself, I did wonder if the teacher was planning to make the task harder; for example, increasing the distance between out partners each time we caught the ball, or passing the ball then immediately stepping down the line to change partners.

The main activity of this lesson was based on practicing hoop shots, which the supply teacher knew these students would enjoy. Each line of students was allocated a hoop and they took it in turns to shoot from a certain line in the court. Some students were better than others with only a few of them actually scoring at all. Supply teacher A did notice this and said to the class that “you can have a maximum of three tries when it’s your turn to shoot.” This increased the likelihood of each student scoring, and worked well. However I found myself wondering if the task could be differentiated or progressed in anyway.

Lesson 2 - Class F

This class had been practicing knocking over skittles with a basket ball so me and Supply teacher A set up lanes using benches with skittles at the end of them. We also wrote names on the board as usual so we could keep track of the scores. Pupil 2 unfortunately was not interested as usual and ran to the corner of the hall, a TA closely following. Supply teacher B and I agreed that we would split the class into two groups and we’d each help to manage one, which I had done before with PE teacher A and knew could work smoothly with this class. At any opportunity I could I made my way over to Pupil 2 and the TA to make sure everything was ok. The TA reassured me they were both doing okay but she didn’t think it would be likely that Pupil 2 would be joining the group for skittle practice. At this moment I grabbed a few different play things that I thought may help to keep Pupil 2 calm and to keep him working in PE. I presented a few different coloured soft play equipment which it was obvious the pupil became interested in. He and the TA began playing with it, gently rolling it to each other; I made sure the TA knew I was always on hand to help out with anything else or if Pupil 2 wanted to play with some other equipment I would be happy to fetch it for him.

The class as a whole worked well in the tasks, with some decent guidance from the TA’s as always. The TA with Pupil 2 attempted to get him involved in the task at one point but he quickly backed down and as thought we all decided it would be best to leave him working in his corner. I tried to implement as much makaton as I could in this lesson, using “good boy” and “good girl” followed by the first letter of the persons name, and I also managed to use phrases like “look this way” and “roll the ball” which I was reassured by the TA’s I was using correctly.

Break Time

Before lesson 3 started, I took the opportunity to locate the office of the physiotherapists to ask them if I could help them one day. I politely offered to spend a day with them the next time I was in and they seem glad to accept, suggesting that I come in for a hydrotherapy session so I can get a different perspective on some of the students I’m working with. I was delighted to do so and it was sorted that I would spend my next wednesday with the physiotherapists.

Lesson 3 - Class D

Football skills was the focus of this lesson. But first the usual warm-up was performed and one pupil needed particular encouragement and so I ran alongside them, persuading them to persevere when they grew tired, which they did. I realised at this point that I was developing a clear bond with some of the children, as my influence was becoming more palpable in times of student exhaustion. This emphasised for me, the real benefit of having someone at your side when performing strenuous physical activity, and that helping each other makes the tasks much more enjoyable.

After the warm-up, PE teacher B asked for a group of four students to stand on the square he had created using cones and asked them to demonstrate good passing technique. Each student performed passes with accuracy, while the rest of the class watched quietly. PE teacher B asked what was good about their technique, as there was clearly an element of their performance he wanted to highlight. After a few guesses, a student noticed the demonstrators trapping the ball with their feet before passing, to keep control. The identifier received applause from his peers and PE teacher B reiterated how useful it was to trap the ball to maintain control. The class were then placed into groups of four, myself included in one group, and were each placed at a set of cones to practice passing. The group I was working with behaved admirably, not just performing with accuracy, but giving positive feedback to each other; I also noticed members in other groups being incredibly patient with those who were struggling slightly and were encouraged to take their time. The groups were then challenged to see how many passes they could perform in thirty seconds, and were challenged afterwards to do the same again but to beat their score; a focus on progression is critical in building skills and repeating an exercise like this enables the class with that knowledge. Both time the whole class were warm towards each others technique and were obviously more excited with the new element of pressure. All groups beat their score the second time.  

Lesson 4 - Class E

This lesson I spent with Supply teacher B. She asked me what the class had been doing and I told her that I had been coordinating lessons with this group recently and was happy to take the next one. Supply teacher B said that, with it being the last PE lesson of term for this class, it would be nice to make sure they have fun and therefore maybe an easier lesson; I told her about my version of goal-ball, or goasket-ball, that I got the class working up to at the end of the previous lesson and suggested that we just enjoy playing that. Supply teacher B was enthusiastic to see exactly what the games was and was happy to let the class do it for the whole lesson.

I introduced the class to the lesson, explaining that to progress and practice our skills that we were going to play the game we played at the end of our previous lesson. The students appeared enthusiastic about this and I asked them if they could remember the rules, which they did. Encouraged by this I initiated the game promptly after the lesson’s introduction and the students quickly got into the game. However I was slightly disappointed to see that the class were forgetting to cooperate in their teams and many members of the class were not actually getting hold of the ball. Me and the teacher decided to enforce a new rule that every player on a team must have touched the ball before that team can attempt to score. Though this worked well to induce team cooperation, the class’s game was not particularly fast-paced, and didn’t exert the students very much.

Towards the end of the lesson, Supply teacher B said the class were not working quickly enough as a team and threatened them with a game of children versus adults. This made the class work harder, but myself, Supply teacher B and the two TA’s all agreed they could still be working harder and for the last ten minutes the adults formed a team to play against the rest of the class. The students were hugely excited by this and moved around much more quickly and cooperated more as a team now that they could see the adults playing vigorously, and also because they were desperate to beat us. Me and the teachers worked the students hard and we all had a good time for this final PE lesson of the term.

Lesson 5 - Class G

PE teacher B had set up an indoors rounders game, using different coloured hoops as posts, in the small hall for Class G today. I was interested to see if this class would fully understand the concepts of this sport, but nonetheless I figured they’d have fun doing it. Pupil 1 entered the room stressed, and expressed very little interest in this lesson by hovering at the entrance. PE teacher B had the class sit on the chairs at the corner of the room to explain the lesson, without making a fuss over Pupil 1’s apprehension. Whilst the lesson was being explained however, Pupil 1 managed to get through the door and began running from the class, a TA followed quickly to fetch him back and volunteered to stay closely with him thereafter.

First of all PE teacher B demonstrated some batting the ball practice with a plastic cricket bat, which the students took turns to try and run around the course afterwards. Most pupils didn’t understand that they had to put the bat down and ran after they had hit the ball, but PE teacher B’s enthusiasm and reference to the coloured hoops caught their attention and they did as instructed, enjoying their run in the process. Making reference to coloured items often helps with teaching young autistic children as it is thought they are generally attracted to colours and pay attention to these details that we would usually perceive as insignificant; I could see PE teacher B was clearly familiar with this notion and had obviously thought ahead when setting up, as I could see he used different coloured hoops to avoid confusion when directing the children to run. Perhaps he had preempted their lack of grasping the concept and had planned to include this use of colour to help them comprehend the order in which posts they had to run to.

After the practice, the rest of the class were instructed to attempt fielding while one member batted; again the use of the coloured hoops was highlighted to help the students understand their places on the pitch. The assistance of the TA’s was required during this time to maintain the student’s attention and encourage them to catch the moving ball. Meanwhile, Pupil 1 was gradually edging further into the small hall and was clearly more interested by the activity, though he refused to try batting when PE teaching B had a go at selling the task to him. It was also this point were I picked up some more maktaon from one of the TA’s when she apologized to one of the students as she had told him to run at the wrong time. Though I hoped I would never have to use this particular symbol, I knew it would be useful to learn, and the more I see makaton being implemented the more help I will be to autistic classes as it’s great for helping children understand.

(below is the makaton symbol for sorry - apologies for the small size)

Live life to the full.

Steve.

Placement Day 9

4/2/13

Today I ended up with another cover teacher, Supply teacher B, who was actually a PE teacher. She had explained to me that in our school she was a science teacher, but she had taught PE before and always enjoyed returning to it.

Lesson 1 - Class A

I updated Supply teacher B on what I had seen this group doing (athletics) and she asked me what I thought of the idea of setting up a circuit based lesson. I thought the idea could be effective as I knew Pupil 1 was easily distracted and may enjoy the many number of things available for him to do. However this is why I also thought a circuit may be a bad idea and I warned her that Pupil 1 may be too distracted by the many activities and may not follow as a circuit. Nonetheless we both figured it was worth a try so we set up the trampette for some basic bouncing as one station, the second was a matted area to do rolling, another station had four upside down benches in a square to balance on, the next had squishy shapes to climb over before jumping onto a mat, and the final station had a large soft cylinder to roll with.

When the class arrived the cover teacher gave them a brief warm up to do, which I had not seen being used before with this group; she asked me to turn the a cd on so the students could simply run around the room to the music. I was impressed to see that none of the class members, including Pupil 1, did not disrupt any of the stations me and the cover teacher had set up. It was also nice for me to see the children enjoying some music as I had not yet seen any music being implemented into any PE lesson yet. I was aware however that some classes do not enjoy hearing music during lesson time, so if I decide to use any I will have to understand the class as a whole first.

After the warm up a teaching assistant was assigned to each student, and I was assigned to Pupil 1 - perhaps because I had mentioned him a lot to the teacher before lesson time and hopefully she thought I knew him well enough to keep him on task. Pupil 1 behaved nicely with me and generally listened to my instructions, with the odd distraction resulting in a small get away. I did notice that he focussed particularly well when balancing on the benches; I figured it was because he was less practiced in balancing as he asked me to guide him continuously. I encouraged him that he was behaving very well and tried to get him walking along independently as much as I could. He responded well at times but still often asked for my assistance, but if I perceived him to be performing effectively then I refused and nurtured him forward, which went brilliantly. There was also a few moments where Pupil 1 was distracted but still by me. In this instance I remembered what the PE teacher had told me about using vocal intonation and trying to add entertainment to the lessons which would help the students to listen to me. I tried addressing Pupil1 in a number of voices which sometimes worked in returning his attention to my instructions, though I could not identify any particular intonation that continued with the same result each time. At one point, when my intonation failed, I decided to perform a roly-poly in front of Pupil 1 which snatched me his attention immediately back. This highlighted for me that PE and any form of physical activity really should be fun and exciting to keep people motivated to do it, otherwise people will lose interest.

Lesson 2 - Class B

The cover teacher knew this class well and said that she had a game in mind for them which was a version of Danish longball - a game that I had never heard of and was instantly interested in. She explained to me that it was like a combination of cricket and dodgeball, and that the students had to hit a ball by a team of fielders and score runs while the fielders had to hit them below the waist with the ball to get them out. This highly active and competitive sounding game is something that I believed would be suitable for this group, as I knew sports arouse their interest and competition can be useful not only in motivating them but in getting them used to performing under pressure.

On arrival the teacher explained that they would be playing Danish longball for a majority of the lesson but first they were going to practice their throwing. I thought this was a great way to construct the lesson as it would warm up the student’s muscles and is a calmer start before a high levels of activity, which may have got the pupils too excited if it was dived straight into. So the pupils were placed into pairs and practiced two different throwing techniques before seeing how many they can get in 30 seconds. Most students found this quite easy but did well to continue after some encouragement from the teaching assistants.

When playing Danish longball, the students seemed riddled with excitement as expected and generally performed well. However I noticed a few students failed to anticipate where the ball would be going, considering every player was right handed. Either they weren’t sure how to understand this concept or they simply were not interested in catching the ball, perhaps because they would feel under pressure to then throw it at the batter. No matter what the reason was I made sure to encourage them to position themselves accurately so they would have a better chance of winning. One or two students responded, while a couple of others did not, and that is when I suspected that they where perhaps not interested in playing. After thinking this I decided I was going to get active. I caught the next ball and threw it across the width of the hall and got the batter out; students where palpably impressed as my actions were quick unexpected. Although I felt mean for deliberately making an effort to get a single student out of the game, particularly as they were one of the more able players and clearly looked disappointed to be leaving without having scored, I still stand by the fact I did well to arouse the fielding teams interest in the game. After this I think the fielders felt more encouraged to make an effort in beating their opponents and continued to perform slightly more energetically.

Lesson 3 - Class C

The supply teacher wasn’t too sure if she knew this class, so enlightened her as to how able they were. We set up the trampette, some mats, a bench as a slide for Pupil 1, and the large trampoline. As a trampoline instructor, the supply teacher was interested to see what work the rebound instructor in this class would be doing. The supply teacher asked to  have a go with the students on the trampoline under the guidance of the rebound instructor, who seemed happy to help. This made me think that perhaps I could have a go one day as the movements are not complex and I do have passion for trampolining as I have one at home. But today I thought it was best to stick with what I know and let the supply teacher and rebound instructor get on.

Today Pupil 1 appeared in a delightful mood, for reasons nobody was actually sure of. As I felt I hadn’t spent much time with this pupil in the past I decided to take advantage of her happy mood and focus on her today. I tried to mimic her movements to grab her attention and also to establish a common status level. I knew how volatile Pupil 1 could be so I figured intimidating her was one of the worst things I could do now she was in such a good mood. She seemed bouncy and giggly and slammed the floor a few times, which I copied to entertain her. Occasionally she laughed, but whether that was because of my actions is unclear. I knew she usually enjoyed sliding down the bench but she hadn’t had a go yet so I tried crawling in front of her and guiding her towards. Initially she was enthusiastic to follow me, so I thought crawling with her clearly worked well, however as soon as we reached the bench-slide she stopped and turned away. In an attempt to entice her back I called her and showed her sliding down the bench myself; she wasn’t interested anymore. I feel this was an exercise in understanding Pupil 1 slightly better, however I get the impression she is a young lady of allegiances and will probably need to have a lot more time and fun with me before I can get her to do anything. Why do I have this impression? Because not long after my endeavors to get Pupil 1 excited by something, a teaching assistant entered the hall and Pupil 1 bounced up and down with joy and went straight over to him. After a small visit I heard the other teaching assistants say that he spends a lot of time with Pupil1 which is why she responds to him. Whether I have the time scope to get Pupil 1 reacting the same way to me I think is doubtful and unrealistic. But I do believe if I continue to pay her attention during our sessions then I may be able to persuade her to perform well in PE.

Lesson 4 - Class D

More Danish longball in this lesson. Class D are slightly less active than Class B so were prepared are few lighter and slightly larger balls and a tennis racket as well as a cricket bat incase some students found batting difficult. We also had a tall cone to act as the marker of the batsman incase students felt more comfortable hitting the ball off the top of the cone, rather than receive a pass from the bowler.

Again Supply teacher B explained what we would be doing but to warm up we were going to practice our throwing. The students were clearly motivated by the idea of Danish longball and worked well as they were eager to try this new sport.

As predicted, Pupil 1 and 2 felt more comfortable hitting the ball from the tall cone rather than receiving a throw from the bowler. Surprisingly, I found that this class communicated more effectively than Class B. They worked well together in teams and made more efficient use of the space when fielding; some students even predicted where the ball would be going according to the batters dominant hand, ability, and usual tactics, unlike the behaviours I observed earlier this morning. I found this to be a remarkable effort made by this class, being motivated by the sport, by the teachers, and by each other; this class has always worked effectively in my experiences, taking on instructions and utilizing specific team members, I thought today was another great example of how this class works together.

Lesson 5 - Class E (my second rolling lesson)

This was my second lesson, and it was going to be follow up from my previous lesson. It was going to be very similar, so it would make good practice for me as I would have the chance to repeat a few things, furthermore it would also be interesting to get the opinion from Supply teacher B. 

This time we did not start with a dribbling warm up, because like the lessons I had seen PE teacher A giving in tennis skills, I wanted to stress the importance of progression, which I discussed at the beginning of the lesson. So this time we went straight into pairs and performed the two minute passing task and kept each others scores. Again, we had a second round where students were encouraged to beat their score. A few issues with counting were still present, but within a smaller number of pairs than the last time so students were clearly starting to understand the concept of the task. This time the progression was good in most pairs improving on their scores.

I then went on to give the same demo I did last lesson on interception, challenging the class to remember that specific term “intercept.” A correct answer was given by a student and I asked them to give a clear definition to the class of an “interceptor” which was delivered accurately. I gave praise as the students did not know what this meant when we had started last lesson and reiterated the definition to clarify. We then played a game of “interceptors,” just like last lesson, but this time I decided to get involved to imbue enthusiasm and effective team cooperation; I remembered the time I had seen PE teacher B getting involved in a game of football which highlighted for me the importance of being a figure of authority but also fun. If the children aren’t having fun while being active it’s going to much harder to motivate them to excel in that activity; getting involved tends to surprise students and helps them to enjoy the activity much more, therefore putting in more effort to excel.

At last we came to a game that I had called “goalsketball,” which was an amalgamation of basketball and the game I knew their PE teacher wanted them working towards, goal-ball. The class were split into teams and were allowed to dribble and pass the ball, just like we had done in the first task, but they had to roll the ball through a goal of two cones being defended by the opposition. I had enforced a rule that nobody was allowed to knock the ball out of another players hands, they could only “intercept” the passes, which was an attempt to implement the new interception concept and perhaps more importantly, safety. I knew some members in this class enjoyed competitive sport and I could see things getting quite rough quickly. Occasionally there were some close calls with regard to physical contact and I had referee firmly, reminding students they were not allowed to touch another player and that if they did so they would get a reminder. This reinforcement using the schools disciplinary system worked well. I also had to improvise a new rule as students were taking shots far too close to the goals and I wanted them to be challenged so I said they could only shoot from their side of the court from that point onwards, which made things much more difficult and more interesting for them. Overall I think the class really enjoyed this game I had created and seemed to engross themselves in it, however I felt there was a more competitive atmosphere than a friendly, team cooperative atmosphere, which is something I will try to encourage if I decide to play this game again with these students.

Live life to the full.

Steve.

Placement Day 8

30/1/13

The day I took my first lesson.

Lesson 1 - Class B

Before this lesson, the PE teacher told me that he was planning to build the session up to a game he called “killer,” which was good for practicing ball control. He said towards the end of the lesson we would set up a bench in the middle of the hall and split the class in half. Each half would line up on either side of the bench and the first person on one side would serve the ball over to the other side; the opponent would return the ball and the pair of them would run to the back of the opposite line while the next players have a go at hitting the ball to the other side. This was a game I had never heard of before and was very excited to see how it would go as it sounded fast-paced and had a competitive edge suitable for this class.

The teacher told the class when they arrived that they would be working up to this game, but they first had to practice some skills. They were put into pair to practice simple squash rallies, bouncing the ball of the wall and allowing their partner to return it. The class worked well in their pairs and the teaching assistants and I made sure to encourage specific pairs. For example I noticed a couple of boys, who would often be tempted to knock the ball around too hard, were controlling the ball well and instead of jumping in each others way the were actually making an effort to take turns in hitting the ball. I picked the moment when their rally accidentally ended to tell them that I was particularly impressed with their effort to take turns and they seemed happy to receive the compliment; they then continued as they were.

After a successful squash practice me and the teacher placed a bench in the middle of the hall and gave the students their “killer” game. The pupils struggled to grasp the concepts at first and were quite excitable, but after a few attempts they seemed to adjust their focus and picked up the rules reasonably well. Moreover they quickly recognised the importance of ball control as many of them were knocking the balls out of the court, which resulted in them being sent out of the game. The teacher had been wise enough to assure the group their first game would be a practice run so they could see how it work, and then they played two more games which resulted in different winners each time. Most students enjoyed the game and were gracious when being sent off. 

Although there was one student who was performing recklessly; he served the ball hard, ran over the bench instead of around, and threw his racket on the floor before sending himself off. There was no indication to a level of frustration, which tends to be the cause of bad behaviour within these pupils, and he had been in one of the pairs that I had specifically encouraged during the practices. This behaviour was unprovoked and unexpected, and just came across as a lack of respect for the rules of the game. The PE teacher stopped the game when this happened and responded to full effect: he asked the pupil to pick up his racket and to play properly, the student was also issued with a formal warning. It was a shame as the rest of the class had behaved beautifully all lesson, until this pupil’s reckless nature got the better of him. Although I could see the PE teacher had reacted appropriately, I wondered if anything could have been done to prevent such behaviour in the future. Given that the actions were unprovoked, my initial answer to this question was no. However, this pupil, along with many in this class, clearly have an enormous amount of energy, an energy that they are obviously desperate to unleash. My thoughts on this were that perhaps more of the tasks and warm ups during the beginning and middle of the lessons could be made more of. I theorised that if an exhaustive workout was given as a warm up or mid-lesson task then perhaps the students in this class would become more docile. On the other hand, making the students more exhausted before the lesson is even over could make them more irritable. I think the only way of knowing if this theory holds any use is to simply give it a trail run some time soon. 

Lesson 2 - Class F

Prior to this lesson, the PE teacher asked if he could “deputize” me. He said he was going to split the class in half and have them doing separate activities. The reason for this was that the class is of very mixed ability, and he wanted to try something slightly different and more challenging with the more able members of the class. He said he would take the slightly lower levels of ability and practice knocking over skittles as normal. He then asked me to lead the higher achievers to practice throwing the balls in different ways as hard and as fast as they can. I was happy to make his idea happen.

This was an interesting task for me as I knew tasks had to be explained clearly to this group; as a personal trainer and more accustomed to a gym environment I am not so use to explaining the tasks in such a broken down manner. Today I felt more like a teacher, which I think was a very beneficial experience as it offered a deeper perspective of coordinating exercises for children with special needs. I had seen the way the PE teacher had handled himself with this group and I attempted to emulate his approach; I spoke slowly and clearly, I made sure not to give the students a ball until my demonstration was over so they wouldn’t be distracted by anything, and I used the coloured court lines on the hall floor which I had seen the teacher often use as reference points to where the students should be starting from and going to etc. At first I was worried that I was explaining things too much, but I remembered the teachers lessons and how well he had explained them. Furthermore I could see the students I was working with were paying attention well, however they looked deep in thought as if they were really trying to absorb my explanations. Realising these elements reassured me and I continued to explain as I had been and asked the students to explain the task back to me so I could be sure they had understood. They listened well and managed to explain each task back to me with accuracy. Each time this happened I felt more confident that explaining things in detail with this group was indeed an effective approach.

Lesson 3 - Class D (outside)

This lesson was on football skills. As usual, the class were asked to perform their warm up of running around the playground and field, touching particular items such as the basketball hoop and a tree; using markers like these work well with this class so they know exactly where they are supposed to run.

PE teacher B set up sets of cones in squares and got four students to perform a demonstration of passing; as always the students picked in this demo were responsive. PE teacher B coaxed the class to stress that trapping the ball before passing was important by getting involved in the demonstration and drawing their attention to what he was doing with his feet. The class correctly identified the trapping technique and said that it was important to help a footballer to control the ball. PE teacher B was most impressed by the beautiful answer given and reiterated the point to the class before placing them into groups of four. PE teacher B reassured them that this was a practice and not a race to encourage good technique and skill. Afterward the PE teacher stated how impressed he was and then got the class to see how many passes they could make in 30 seconds. When asking each team for their score at the end, as usual he was overtly enthusiastic in response and imbued vicarious encouragement therefore. PE teacher B then challenged students to do the same task again but this time they needed to beat their previous score; all teams either matched and beat their previous score and the teacher expressed that these results proved that the class were making steady progression in football skills.

The next exercise was a dribbling task, with the class split into two lines in front of a row of cones to dribble the ball around. This was performed a couple of times to see which line of people would finish first. To prevent a huge loss, the teacher had organised the groups in terms of ability so the that it would be a fair challenge. This is something that I know I would need to keep in mind when I split the class during my own lessons, in case members are sensitive to losing. This group though, have a clear respect for one another and display patience when a member of the class is struggling, and applaud each others achievements; they are obviously being taught well and are hard-working.

Lesson 4 - Class E (my rolling lesson)

This was the first lesson I had been able to lead on my own. I had prepared a lesson full of rolling skills that I hoped would help the class’s aim of playing a game of goal-ball one day. I started the class with some simple dribble practice and gave a demonstration. I have to admit at this point I felt particularly nervous as it was the first time I had spoken to the class as whole, but I knew whether my lesson turned out to be amazing or a disaster I would learn something from it. I delivered specific teaching points such as “the ball must bounce up to hip level” and “you can only use one hand.” I also asked random individuals questions like: “is this bouncing the ball at hip level?” while purposefully bouncing the ball high above my head, making the students laugh.

We then moved on to the main tasks which i had written on the whiteboard along with the students names, already set into pairs; this was supposed to save time during the lesson but a couple of students were missing today and I had to rearrange some pupils. With a bit of help from the teachers we established even paris in the room and I challenged the class to dribble the ball up and down the width of the hall before passing it to their partner in two minutes. The pairs worked well but some seemed to count inconsistently, me and the TA’s went around the room to help but some students just couldn’t apply this simple numerical element. Some TA’s stuck with particular pairs to count for them which helped a lot. After receiving the scores and writing on the whiteboard I then challenged the class to another two minutes to beat their own score. However most pupils were tired from this task and seemed intimidated by the challenge; I knew this second round would be much harder but I encouraged them to try and the students had a go anyway. Again the numerical element was an issue and it ended up difficult to tell if some pairs had met their previous score, however some pairs had counted effectively and had even improved. By this time it was clearly visible to everyone in the room that the class was tired, and I highlighted this to the students by drawing their attention to each others rosy cheeks and heavy breathing, and stating that “this is a sign that you’ve been working hard so well done.” When highlighting this the students seemed more motivated and looked pleased with themselves when I stressed how hard they were obviously working. The intensity of this activity was high, and it was aimed to be high so that these students would be burning calories in a short space of time which will illicit a fat burning response. Though I almost felt bad for wearing the students out very quickly, I knew that it was good for their health, and remembering the statistical data I drew up in my portfolio about links between obesity and special needs children, I knew that this what I was here to do...to get kids moving and enjoy moving!

PE teacher A had given me a sheet of aims for this class the week before, and one of their aims was to understand and implement interception. So the next task was a game I created called interceptors where a member of the class was an interceptor who had to pick up the basketball while it was being passed by the rest of the class; in other words it was closely related to piggy in the middle. PE teacher A specifically complemented me on my method of introducing literacy during a demonstration and then reinforcing its meaning by giving the class a game to play based on that literary concept. Although I felt the basic aims of my lesson were met i.e. getting the kids to perform intensely in a short space of time, helping them understand a literary concept, and working on skills to help them build to a game of goal-ball, I wondered if my methods were creative enough; I had researched different therapies, particularly visual, that I had intended to include in lessons and hadn’t done during this one, so what made it so different from any other PE lesson? Well I had enjoyed my first lesson and I felt it was a good start to my learning curve, however I would like to attempt more innovative ways of teaching. Furthermore, I have taken lots more time observing and getting to know the classes more than planned; while this is not a problem, merely an adaption to my project, it does mean that I am considering staying a few weeks longer.

Lesson 5 - Class G

This was a simple and pleasant end to the day with Class G. We were in the small hall and PE teacher B brought a basket of different types of bouncy balls for them to play with. He, the TA’s, myself and the children spent the session picking balls out of the basket and just bouncing the balls around the room. Me and the teachers made an effort to encourage pupils to catch, throw, and bounce different kinds of balls. The students were fascinated by the array of colour, the size and shapes of balls, and watching different balls bounce in different ways. The lesson was clearly an enjoyable one for the class, with everyone joining in and enjoying themselves. At the end PE teacher B made the clearing up part into a game for everyone by challenging us to see if we can pick up a ball and bounce it the basket from where we were standing. Eventually all the balls were put away and finished day 8 off nicely.

Live life to the full.

Steve.

Makaton

A few makaton sources I've used to help me communicate in some lessons.