During this practicum, we were to be teaching 25% of the time, prepping 25% of the time and observing the other 50%. This was not the case with my practicum, because I advocated for my own learning. I learn best by “doing,” and receiving formative feedback on how to improve. I thought this to be easier if I took over the class full-time, so I could build on my own lesson plans and learning progressions. So, let’s just say that teaching two, 3 hour blocks of Gr. 10 P.E. was absolutely exceptional thanks to the utmost support of my coaching teacher for letting me try new things, give feedback on lessons and help reflect as I move forward.

My main 3 goals as I entered this practicum were this:

  1. Learn how ADST as a pedagogy and FPPL could be implemented in an every day P.E. class
  2. Be clear on my expectations for learning throughout my time so that ALL students felt they were equal in a safe environment.
  3. Not only “Keep Girls in Sport” but also inspire those not keen on P.E. to find a physical activity they enjoyed and would continue with. I wanted to inspire “Healthy Living” as a whole

So how did I implement these goals? I started out immediately by building relationships and finding out who my students are. I found out their electives, their current jobs, hobbies and dislikes. I made my expectations of learning intentions clear at the beginning of practicum and re-iterated them every day. These two things helped achieve the overall “Big Idea” I wanted to share, which is that P.E. is for everyone.

When some think back to their P.E. times in Highschool, they aren’t exactly fond of the memory. Usually because P.E. seemed heavily reliant on sports that involved a ball, puck, frisbee etc… but the classroom and objectives have changed. Although I had no control over the content of which sport I was teaching (Pickleball, Ultimate Frisbee, Soccer, Volleyball & Badminton) I explained to my classes that:

  1. Being “good” at a sport will not be the reason you get an “A” in this class
  2. This class is about being inclusive, building skills, and developing life-long relationships with activity
  3. If you are the person who dislikes or “hates” sports, this class is still for you! If you are that person, I would take the opportunity to participate heavily in the warm-ups and cool-downs which I will be giving different types of physical activity, and hopefully you enjoy one enough to continue with it.

Every day for the next 3 weeks, we did warmups and cooldowns together, giving modifications, low-impact and high-impact options so that each student could challenge themselves individually. For warmups, I introduced workouts like Cardio Kick Boxing, HIIT circuits, Tabata and Zumba (we don’t use trigger words like “dance” and “Zumba” though). For cool-downs, we would debrief on what muscles were used (or what was sore) and learned copious stretches together. We were able to discuss health benefits of both warm-ups and cool-downs and learn about our bodies, how to monitor exertion levels and eventually- students were able to advocate for their own warm-ups and cool-downs based on their needs. It was such an amazing process to watch, especially when you have a 99% buy in.

When it came to implementing ADST as a pedagogy into the classroom I wasn’t quite sure where to start. My first initial reaction was if I let students be “curious” and “create” with P.E. equipment, I would surely be fired. But I realized that ADST is what you make it- so by encouraging students and giving time to “tinker” with their skills once introduced in a safe manner, I found many students working on skills THEY wanted to improve. It was really neat to see certain goals each individual had and many times they were open to sharing and reflecting with me and the class- which richened everyone’s experience.

We also used the app “Socrative” which creates a virtual, online communication network between teacher and students to gather formative feedback data on both accounts. On the app we as teachers are able to ask questions to our students how things are going, what they are working on, what they would like to see more or less of, and adapt our teachings to their feedback. What I love about the app is you can set it up so that students can put their name or you can manipulate it for anonymous feedback, which definitely creates room for honesty and a shield for vulnerability!

I struggled with implementing FPPL into the classroom with activities, mainly because we wouldn’t have the opportunity to do this until mini-games and even then, my knowledge is very limited. So for next practicum, I would definitely say that will need drastic improvement. I was able to meet with the CSS resource teacher, where we gathered resources to make this process easier for my next practicum, so I am very excited to research, study and learn on my own and alongside my students next time. Not all was lost though; we verbally discussed some principles as we were learning, especially with new skills reminding that “Learning requires patience and time,” and “Learning is holistic and reflexive.” We talked about what this means and what it could look like to keep up engaged and less frustrated when we are challenged.

I could go on and on about the students themselves, their learnings, their struggles, weakness, accomplishments and strengths. I could talk endlessly about situations that made me come home feeling triumphant and some that made me come home almost in tears. The truth is, I could comment how the relationships with my students over the last three weeks just solidified my reasons for wanting to be an educator, but for this blog, we will keep it at the reflective/ material level.

All I can say in conclusion is, I am absolutely grateful for this experience. To learn, grow and play alongside my students and have a mentor right there to bounce ideas off of allowed me to really nurture the skills I already possessed and grow them as well as reflect and build new skills for the future. I am so excited for my next practicum, wherever it may be; I am ecstatic to keep learning (and to keep stealing resources!)