At the beginning of each week, I wonder what I will be writing about at week's end. I write notes as the week progresses and I am never surprised at how much I have to share!
.....I have previously mentioned our "Share Count Stretching" during which I count while stretching and students respond with the next number in sequence. I always enjoy this because it helps to engage everyone while stretching and also helps to slow down the stretching process. It is also wonderful when students teach all of us how to count in different languages! This week the class and I learned how to count in Vietnamese!
.....As we continued our unit of Gymnastics, one of my younger students exclaimed: "This is fun!" It's great when I get a chance to experience an activity through the eyes of a student who may be participating in it for the first time!
.....This week's warm-up was "Monkey in the Middle", where students perform an exercise for others to follow along. There is a great song from the Physical ED CD by the Learning Station that goes along with the activity. My students absolutely love this activity and we often use it for our school-wide Fitness Friday activities. As one of my classes was participating in the warm-up, the gym door was open and I overheard students in the hallway get very excited about the prospect of doing it for their PE class!
.....Last week I mentioned that during Science Fair time, students often ask to borrow heart rate monitors to work on their projects. I think this is terrific and this week another student asked to borrow a heart rate monitor and as we were talking about his project, I was able to give him some ideas to try while using the monitor. He was eager to try out some of the ideas and I can't wait to see his project!
.....A few weeks ago I was talking about students displaying their "PE Best". I compared their work during PE class to exemplary work that is displayed on bulletin boards in the hallway. I told students that it would be difficult to display their "PE Best" because actual students can not be displayed on a board. I got quite a few laughs from that one! A student raised her hand and said that I might not be able to display students, but I could display their photographs on a bulletin board! I thought that was a great idea, but kept thinking about ways to display students' "PE Best". We are fortunate to have an Ellison Die Cut machine at our school and two of the die cuts are boys and girls! I have cut-outs ready to go and soon students will be decorating "themselves" so that I can hang the cut-outs up! I told this particular student that she had helped me with this idea and she was very proud!
.....Exercise Ernie was in a fifth grade class this week. Some of the students decided to call him "Exercise Ernest" so that he feels a little grown up!
.....I was surprised this week to have an entire fifth grade class, including the teacher, complete and turn in the latest Fitness Calendar! The teacher thought it would be great to support the program and the class completed an activity per day. Absent students made up the work when they got back to school! I went down to the class to compliment their work with one word: AWESOME! They were very proud of their work! I was too!
.....A kindergarten student was learning a new skill and told me this week: "If you focus, you can do it!" He was right!
I hope you enjoyed the "Best Parts of My Week!"
Visit the North Park PE website if you would like more information about the PE program at North Park!
