Throwing With St. Mary's

Lab 4 at St. Mary's had my group participating as the gym group. I was actually way less nervous going into this lab then any other one. This is mainly because I now know what I am doing and I feel much more confident in the games that I had picked out for the students to play. Nate played the games Oscar's garbage can that had the students throwing the balls into the makeshift trash can. I was Oscar and was in the "trash can" retrieving balls for the students. The students loved the game and we had to pull them away from the game they loved it so much. This just shows how much they loved this game and how much better our class as a whole has got at picking out the games and explaining them to the students.

Check out my Lab 4 write up

Boston Madness

Boston has been quite the trip so far and its only Wednesday! Tuesday morning a group of us started the convention off with the exergames. This was where a group of us split up and showed actual P.E. teachers what technology they can use in their classes for their students. The list of various games included, just dance, a different version of dance dance revolution (called idance) in which each student gets a mat, and an interactive kickboxing game. These are just three of the many different stations that we had set up but by far the most interesting was the interactive kickboxing. I have personally never seen anything like it and what it essential had was a screen with different motions and the player would have to kick or punch a certian part of the mat in the direction that it said to. I attached a picture of the kickboxing game in action so everyone can have a better understanding in to what it looked like. The exhibit was a great success and the turn out was great    and everyone worked hard to make it the best yet! That same Tuesday night, there was a huge fire in the nearby hotel and it cut out the power of most of the area in which we are staying in. This caused the Wednesday of the convention to be canceled entirely. What a first two days at Boston can't wait to see what the remainder of the week has in store for us. 

St. Mary's Part 3

Going into lab 3 I was really excited because I was working with the older students at St. Mary's and it was just a complete change from last time when I was working with the pre-k group. I was excited going into the day that's for sure. I started by going down into the cafeteria and played checkers, legos, and various other games with the students. I had some nice conversations with the students about sports and what our favorite sports teams are. This however was short lived and when we got up to the gym the students didn't want to play my game at all. Not a single person, they just wanted to play basketball. In their defense, I don't think I did this best job of explaining the games and that is my fault. We finally, got to play other games with them, but they did not like my type of game. The students told me that they love tag and we ended up playing various different tag games before finally, doing the song and dance that Nate had set out for the students to do. The picture I added in the upper right is a picture of me interacting with a few of the students in the cafeteria. This was the high point for me during class because the students were interacting with me and I think everyone was enjoying it at this point. I was disappointed at first that they didn't want to play my game but I am not anymore. In reality, this is a learning experience for and I now know that I have to work harder to find a game that these students are going to like. My group has the gym group next class and I can't wait to get back to St. Mary's and come up with a great game that they the students want to play and will still benefit greatly from it!



  Check out my write up from: Lab 3

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