PHASE 3 OF THE SPORTS CLUB AND USING DIFFERENT COACHING STYLES

PHASE 3 OF THE SPORTS CLUB AND USING DIFFERENT COACHING STYLES

The beginning of the 2nd Half term, the next stage of the Sports Crew Club and why we used different coaching styles to help mentor the children.

This weeks blog is a diary entry from the children's phase 3 Sports Crew training, what the 3rd phase is, why the club needs it and why we at JCPE might use different coaching/ mentoring styles to help the children improve as leaders. Also included in this week’s blog are resources for help with leading sessions in different ways, why you might want to do this and what the results may be. 

Phase 3 of the Sports Crew

This half term began with the club being suspended to allow the children and myself time to come together and work on the next step of our model. Phase 1 and 2 focused on the set-up of the club and the introduction of their media interviews. Phase 3 is the involvement of competition into the club at lunchtime and the creation of a "season". 

The plan over the next 6 weeks of the half term is that children will lead their own games. These games will evolve around a particular sport, with the current season being a bowling season. We start with bowling because we believe it's a sport that requires as little amount of organising, which is brilliant for the children to practice their "coaching" skills and a smaller amount of behaviour management is needed. The season will end with a season final, where children can be in small teams and compete to win the current bowling season. The Sports Crew will then hold some festivity celebrations in assembly at the end of the half term to announce the winners of the lunchtime bowling  season. This adds some extra incentive on top of the stickers and toys, that children collect for their excellent physical activity at lunchtimes. We introduced the children to 5 fun games that all involve the skill of bowling, which should help the children bowl better in the final if this season. Each week brings a new game and each day brings a new leader to lead the games but there's a host of other roles I.E Referee, coach, players for the SportsCrew leaders to occupy.

Throughout our time together, I've used a number of different coaching styles to help myself achieve my goals as a mentor but also to help the young leaders achieve their goals. At the beginning of this project I had to use a very command style approach, especially when introducing the safety side of the sessions. As the club began to move on, I've tried my best to move up the spectrum of teaching and help the children think for themselves. For example in the phase 3 training, I needed a way to introduce the new bowling games in a way that got the children thinking about the game, how it worked but also how it would work as themselves as the leader, what would they do, how would they lead it? I lead a reciprocal teaching approach, in small teams they each sat around one of the games resource cards, discussed the rules of the games and then lead that game to the rest of the group. This was a great way to get children thinking about the fun aspect of the games (as they acted as participants) and how to think of the game as a leader. Resources about the practice spectrum and teaching styles are included at the bottom of the blog. 

It's incredibly important to us as teachers to use different teaching styles, I believe it engages children into learning on a greater scale. Of course there are times to use the traditional teacher centred lessons but it's also as important to have times where teachers aren't stood in front of the class saying "do this" or "do that". Sometimes it will be our job as a teacher to create the environment for children to discover their own learning, to make their own mistakes and to help them discover how to fix it. Attached at the bottom is a great TED talk about inspiring the future student, it links our practical teaching and also how to inspire the student.

The Leaders were very enthusiastic on the day of their phase 3 training, the weather wasn't great but it didn't seem to alter their enthusiasm. Together as a big group we had a number of reflections, We encouraged children to think about how they are going to make their sessions "special". They really seem to react to the idea that they can make it their own but at the same time like the help of the resources we are passing on to the children. 

Thank you for reading and for your continued support. We are about to enter the winter which gives  the chance for some cold weather conditions, outdoor activity might become intermitted so if you're a parent, guardian or teacher lets try to help keep children active through this cold period! and also help the Sports Crew motivate participants at lunchtime. 

JC

RESOURCES

http://users.rowan.edu/~conet/ElemPE/mosston-teaching-styles.html (The teaching styles)

http://mail.spectrumofteachingstyles.org/assets/files/articles/TeachingStyles%20inPEandMosstonsSpectrum.pdf (Tips for using the styles and a review of using Mosston styles)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVLM2BrOEq4 (Introduction to teaching styles)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCFg9bcW7Bk (Teaching methods for inspiring the future)