Kids have an almost congenital love of games. Given that, it’s not surprising that teachers can achieve amazing results when they make physical education (PE) classes more game-like.
For example, they can turn jogging into a kind of treasure hunt by assigning kids to teams, giving each team a map of the school grounds, and having them race to and check in at specified destinations. The team that completes the course in the shortest time wins. Such an approach not only makes running more interesting, but also teaches kids to read maps.
Tweaking the rules
“Girls, hide at the back with strips of cloth in your hand,” orders a team captain. “Shriek if someone grabs the cloth. The louder you yell, the less anyone is going to want to get close.”
Welcome to the PE class at Taipei’s Shuangyuan Elementary School, where Chou Chien-chih’s ideas are taken very seriously indeed. The “grab the cloth” game described above is a case in point, requiring students to strategize to win.
Chou believes that Taiwanese parents and teachers are too fond of telling children how to do things, which keeps them from learning to think for themselves. He uses team-oriented games to encourage kids to discuss strategy and how to best position teammates. Teachers refrain from commenting on their decisions until the post-match critique.
“If you want kids to hone their creative-thinking and problem-solving skills, you have to get them to use their brains,” says Chou.
In addition, kids who aren’t very good at sports, and girls more generally, have a tendency to act like wallflowers in PE class. Fortunately, making just slight changes to game rules can encourage such kids to participate.
One problem that crops up in co-ed basketball is that the boys rarely pass the ball to the girls. Tweaking the rules of the game by counting only points scored by the girls or by requiring teams to pass the ball five times before taking a shot increases the girls’ scoring opportunities and their sense of achievement.
Chou once even had students play while seated on the kind of flatbed trolleys you often see at warehouse stores. Because the girls were more adept at maneuvering the trolleys, the boys had to work with them to have a chance at winning.
By using games to spark children’s interest in exercise, Taiwan’s teachers can make PE exciting and fun for even more children!
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