As a Health and Physical Education teacher, I am often looking for creative ways to get students more actively involved in sport and fitness. One of the largest challenges I face is how to foster a willingness to participate when there is such a broad range of athletic skill and fitness within any given group of students.
While I spend a lot of time engaging in activities that are not necessarily competitive in nature, I also have my students participate in many activities that are. This element of competition, can at times, cause anxiety and a lack of confidence for some of my students.
While searching for new and innovative ways to encourage participation of my students I came across this article:
Summary:
Students now playing soccer without a ball. The idea is to use your imagination. If you imagine you are good at soccer...then you are.
My initial thoughts regarding this creative approach to sport were:
“How does this even work?”
“Are students seriously interested in this version of gameplay?”
“What tips, techniques and strategies should a teacher/coach provide?”
I am not sure I am sold on this idea being innovative. I understand the merit in eliminating the competitive nature of sport, but what about the other valuable skills that are learned through participation in competition. If there is no “winner” or “loser” how do students learn to be a good winner and/or looser? How will students learn to navigate the competitive nature of various workplaces? What about the impact competitive sports have on motivation, personal challenge, strategy, teamwork, etc?
What do you think? Is this approach to game play creative? Innovative? Or Missing the point?
Here is an article on removing score as a creative method to focus on skill development rather than winning:
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/no-winners-children-still-keeping-score-despite-move-to-end-sports-competition
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