The Great Debate

I first of all want to say that every group sticks in sports, lifetime skills, and the skills advocate group did a great job representing their category. The debate started off and each group got to state their case. I do know that a few groups got cut short in what they wanted to say but that’s because of time issues but I still feel like everyone got their points across to their best ability. After each group stated their main points there was another time in which we would ask each group questions about their group and how they were going to answer certain situations that may occur under their system. My group was the skills advocates and we all had a heated debate all around and there were plenty of good points that were brought up. We finally made a final statements and then we waited for the board of ed group to make a decision and they came to the conclusion that both the skills advocates and the lifetime pe groups would share the program and would have to work together to build one big program. The debate went over well and many of us tweeted in updates and there was a live stream that was uploaded on our class website so that other people could follow along the great debate. In my personal opinion, I felt the debate went over well and my group of the skills advocates did a great job with the power point and putting together a great argument so that we were in the best position to win over the board. The picture I uploaded here is our group working together to come up with rebuttal questions to ask the other groups. Overall, great job by every group and I was very happy how my group worked together as team to truly have a great debate!

Hall of Shame games

I was very surprised to see some of my old favorite games in the Hall of Shame. Admittingly at first, I was a little annoyed that some of my games of the past are being regarded so poorly. After reading the reasoning behind the madness of these games being elected into the hall I now have a new and open mind about these games. The hall of shame went into lengthy discussions on why each game was in there. These games should all be in their for the right reasons such as games that use humans as targets, games that have the students line up, and the games that have elimination in them so that only the strong in that area will survive. One game in particular that is in the hall that I think can be altered and potentially taking out of is tag. Tag is in the hall because of the fact that it is an elimination game and tag in particular is a game where the stronger of the class go after and gang up on the inferior students of the class. However,  I do believe that a game like tag can be altered in a way so that it can support all students and not involve elimination in some ways. You can vary tag and make it a game such a hospital tag where everyone is "it" but after you are tagged twice you simple do something like 10 jumping jacks and you can come back in. This way there is not one person being singled out as being "it" and there is technically no elimination. A game like hospital tag is only one way it can be varied and there are several others but that isn't the point. The point is that a game like tag, dodge ball, or any other game can be varied in a way to meet all requirements. I do believe that these games that are presented as is should be in the hall of shame, but on the other hand I also believe that any game can be varied in such a way that no game should have to put itself in the low aspect of being in the hall of shame. Overall, I do believe that dodge ball is not a game that we should be playing in a physical education environment, but with the right variations in place any game including a form of dodge ball can be played and be an effective game and help not just the stronger and more athletically gifted students but all students.

Healthy New Years Resolution Video

Check out the Video that Nate and I made to show everyone how we are using technology to stay healthy, fit, and active this new year.

Valentines day with Pre K

I was really nervous going to this day mainly because I really didn't know what to expect. I knew going in that my group was in the Pre-K group and me and my group struggled to come up with games that would be simple enough that the students would be able to complete them and would not struggle with their complexity. I had a blast playing and doing various activities with these students. Each week I becoming more and more convinced that I want to be a physical educator and I even am more willing to work with elementary students than I was before. The picture I added to right is a picture of me instructing the Pre-K students in the gym before we started an activity. I like the fact that you can see the side of one students face so everyone can see that the students were actually listening to me for a couple of minutes. I really enjoyed Lab 2 with the students and it just made me more excited for Lab 3.

Lab 2 write up

Reflections on Penn State and Syracuse

By now mostly everyone may know about the two major child sex abuse scandals that have occurred at two major colleges, both of these occurred on the east coast. First, the story of Jerry Sandusky at Penn State came out and then soon after allegations came out on a coach at Syracuse University’s coach Bernie Fine. At Penn State Jerry Sandusky is being accused of molesting children in the showers after hosting a charity program on the Penn State campus. These boys were about 10-12 years old and the story was essentially covered up by some Penn State officials for many years until the boys spoke out now many years later.  The situation just disgusts me that this was allowed to go on in the showers of a major university like this and that no one stepped up and said anything to authorities outside of the University. Based on the story that was released to the media I man saw Sandusky in action and reported it to the superiors in the school but did not call authorities outside; no one did. As a result of no one calling the school president, athletic director, and legendary coach Joe Paterno were all let go from the school. Sandusky’s lawyer stated that Jerry was just showing these under privileged boys how to use soap in the shower which I personally believe is a joke that he would have his well respected lawyer say that. There is no way around the fact that Sandusky is guilty, but the question is could this have been prevented? Of course it could have and the officials of Penn State should have been looking into Sandusky but they didn’t do anything they let him do whatever he wanted because he used to coach there. This could have been prevented and I now know this based on the training we received last week in class that we simply just have to call a hotline if we are even suspicious of anyone. The case of Bernie Fine at Syracuse is a little bit different in that Fine did not perform his sexual abuse at the school and under the schools facilities. Also, there is no accusing of anyone associated with the school knowing what Bernie Fine was doing to these ball boys for the team. Either way Fine was abusing these boys in the basement of his own home and no one was really suspicious of him. I feel that a red flag should have been up when Fine was bringing these boys back to his house and maybe someone should have looked into it, but no one did and these boys were sexual abused. No matter what way you look at a sexual abuse situation they can be prevented in one way or another. As a future educator I know what signs to look for so I can report something or just talk to a student to see if anything is actually going on because the things that Jerry Sandusky and Bernie Fine did to these boys shouldn’t happen to anyone.

Lab 1

When walking into and thinking about going into St. Mary's school I honestly had no idea what to except. I have worked with children plenty of times in various programs and coaching various teams but I was still nervous and had no idea what was going on at first. At first, we were just sitting around and watching the kids participate in various different games. Finally, we started to participate and I started having a great time. I soon realized why I had chose this major and I was having a great time and I had the biggest smile on my face. We then walked around and started talking to different children as they were doing various activities from playing with legos, to coloring, or even just playing with magnet numbers. The ages ranged anywhere from pre k all the way to 5th grade. Just interacting and talking with the various different children was an experience in its own but I think one class just reinforced my decision to be a physical educator because I love working with children.

Lab 1

Affective Growth

Affective growth is the same thing as social-emotional development. In essence, affective growth is learning that increases the ability to act, interact, and react effectively with people and themselves. Physical activity impacts affective growth in several different ways. First, experiences that involve movement play an important role in how children view themselves and others. Affective growth also includes self concept. Being good at sports and various different physical activities contributes to a child's positive self concept, but it is not the way that a self concept is established. Self concept is basically how someone views themselves. It can be in a physical, cognitive, or social setting. Some of the components of self concept are belonging, perceived competence, worthiness, acceptance of self, uniqueness, virtue. As a child they usual have an extremely good or extremely bad self concept. Positive Socialization is another aspect of affective growth. This, unlike self concept, is all about how one interacts within a group. Physical activity or participating in a team setting helps this idea out a great deal. Some components of positive socialization include group affiliation, attitude formation, character education, and moral growth.