Equipment
For this volleyball unit the following equipment is required:
-12 Volleyballs
- Cones
- 3 Volleyball nets
- Ball bin
All of our equipment was stored in a separate room and only distributed to the students when a teacher was present. All equipment that was not in use remained in the closet or ball bin so that there were no safety hazards.
Grouping Strategies
To group the students, we numbered them off from one to however many groups we needed. This way, the students would be grouped with different people each class, and we were able to manipulate the groups so that they were all of similar skill level.
We ensured to only break the students into groups after all of the instructions had been given to avoid distractions or movement before we were done explaining.
Other good ways of grouping students can be creative, such as "pair up with someone with the same color shoes as you," or "someone born in the same month as you." It is important to keep changing the groups, otherwise students will always choose the same partner/group. If this happens then they are missing a large part of the social development they get when learning to work with different groups!
Routines and Procedures
We followed the routines and procedures that were explained to us by our supervising teacher.
-always change into gym strip to set an example and encourage kids to remember their gym change
-let the students know that if they want to speak during class they always need to raise their hands first
-they are asked to let us know when they need to use the washroom and then are open to go, one at a time
-the students do not go into the gym until a teacher is there to unlock it
Discipline Strategies
Our first goal was to create an atmosphere where the students were always engaged and active in the class to minimize behaviour issues. Additionally, it was important to set out expectations and consequences in the first class so that the students knew what acceptable behaviour was. If behaviour issues did arise, we were careful to get them under control quickly by positioning ourselves close to the offending students and separating them from other distracting students. A great way to prevent these problems was to ensure that we could see all of the students at all times. Strategies to help with this included having the class sit down when giving instructions and circulating the group constantly when they were participating in an activity. Most behaviour problems were prevented by being a visible and constant presence for the students.