Everybody was in good spirits today, what with the sun shining and the promise of a warm, sunny weekend.
We ran through where the organs are found in the body and talked a little bit about function. We tried to keep this simple - the heart pumps blood around the body and to the lungs. The liver helps to detoxify the body. The stomach stores food and begins the digestion process. For the most part, we were able to remain along these lines, although the kids being as they are, were keen to know quite a bit about poo and where it goes in the digestion process. There was lots of "eeewwwing" and "ugghhhing" but generally, they all learned something. There was a slightly dicey moment when we were talking about blood sugar. "Does anyone know what raises blood sugar?" was the question we asked, looking for "insulin" as the answer. One of the older kids, entirely innocently, shouted out "heroin!" which took us completely by surprise! A little inappropriate though it was, her answer was correct! When her mum reprimanded her, she was quite upset and said, "but it's what they said on The Simpsons!" Fair enough. David pointed out that, although there are very "bad" things such as drugs and alcohol that can play havoc with blood sugar levels, sugar itself in any form can be harmful if intake is excessive. Which then led back to diabetes and insulin - nicely done.
We then took them outside at which point they all ran riot around the playing field. Shouting "last one back here does 10 push ups!" worked quite well in getting them back in some kind of order though. We asked them to take their shoes off and the universal response was, "ah, that feels so much nicer than sweaty shoes". Exactly! The rest of the session involved a warm up, running drills, follow the leader and some sprint work.
The kids loved the sprinting! There's something about speed when you're little - I used to love running as fast as I could and feel the exhileration of wind rushing at my face and by my ears. We don't tend to do that as adults - when was the last time you saw an adult run as fast as they could and then fall over laughing? Most adult runners I see look absolutley miserable and this is the problem with running - people forget to enjoy it! This is one of our aims with the course - for the children to recognise their love of running and for adults to rediscover it.
Tired, happy people at the end of the session. We've given each family an inspirational runner who will be the topic of the project they'll be working on from now until the end of the course. Next week we'll be talking more about barefoot running and introducing legends who've overcome injuries with the help of barefoot running.
Monday, 11 April 2011
Sunday, 10 April 2011
Week Three
Today was our assessment day. Our project manager from The Big Lottery "Life in London" scheme was waiting for us in the school foyer, ready to report on how we're doing with the course so far. It certainly didn't feel like an assessment - she didn't sit there with a clipboard taking notes with pursed lips. On the contrary, she joined in and helped to keep control of some of the more "excitable" pupils so, in fact, her presence was quite reassuring!
Today, as is becoming the custom, we ran through some of the muscle and bone names and where they're found in the body. We bring "Stan the skeleton" with us each week to help us with this - it's very useful to have him as a prop.
We'd asked the group to come up with some facts about organs and one pupil had really spent a great deal of time on his research. His hand shot up with every question we asked and our project manager later referred to him as "the one with the encyclopedic knowledge". The others had done their homework too so our section on organs went well. We'd decided to cover organ location this session and leave function until next week. We've already clocked on to the fact that, whatever we've planned, we'll only cover about half of it, so we thought it best to teach organs over two sessions. The whole group found it fascinating to find out about all the organs in their body and we managed to keep them interested for quite some time. We went slightly off track (this happens a lot!) when someone asked why veins appear blue but blood is red.....but got back on track eventually.
We made them all work physically harder today. We had them in rows, taking it in turns to run different drills up and down the sports hall having already done their standing and floor exercises. All of the group did the drills as directed, apart from one little chap who has so much energy that he's unable to slow down and control a series of knee lifts or side steps and just hurtles from one end of the hall to the other.
We were able to fully explain the homework today without interruption. We'd brought juice with us this week, so a combination of guzzling and exhaustion meant that everyone was blissfully quiet.
Our project manager seemed pleased with how we're doing. She was very positive about our interactive way of teaching and the group did us proud knowing lots of answers and responding well.
Today, as is becoming the custom, we ran through some of the muscle and bone names and where they're found in the body. We bring "Stan the skeleton" with us each week to help us with this - it's very useful to have him as a prop.
We'd asked the group to come up with some facts about organs and one pupil had really spent a great deal of time on his research. His hand shot up with every question we asked and our project manager later referred to him as "the one with the encyclopedic knowledge". The others had done their homework too so our section on organs went well. We'd decided to cover organ location this session and leave function until next week. We've already clocked on to the fact that, whatever we've planned, we'll only cover about half of it, so we thought it best to teach organs over two sessions. The whole group found it fascinating to find out about all the organs in their body and we managed to keep them interested for quite some time. We went slightly off track (this happens a lot!) when someone asked why veins appear blue but blood is red.....but got back on track eventually.
We made them all work physically harder today. We had them in rows, taking it in turns to run different drills up and down the sports hall having already done their standing and floor exercises. All of the group did the drills as directed, apart from one little chap who has so much energy that he's unable to slow down and control a series of knee lifts or side steps and just hurtles from one end of the hall to the other.
We were able to fully explain the homework today without interruption. We'd brought juice with us this week, so a combination of guzzling and exhaustion meant that everyone was blissfully quiet.
Our project manager seemed pleased with how we're doing. She was very positive about our interactive way of teaching and the group did us proud knowing lots of answers and responding well.
Wednesday, 6 April 2011
Week Two
Today's session was all about muscles. We asked everybody how many muscles there are in the human body and, although the answers ranged from 102 to 70,000, the majority had found out that there's somewhere between 640 and 800.
Some of the participants are obviously very internet savvy and had discovered some fantastic facts such as the stapedius is the smallest muscle in the body (it's in the ear, by the way). Quite a few of them had come across the fact that the tongue is the strongest muscle.
Happily, one boy had found out that there are three main muscle types (skeletal, smooth and cardiac) so we ran through those as well as teaching them the basic muscles in the body. We did this by writing the names of muscles on stickers and then using our resident "naughty" pupil as "Sticker Man" (which apparently became his nickname) and asking other pupils to place each sticker on the appropriate muscle. Our little "Sticker Man" was very amused by the "Gluteus Maximus" and it's now his standard answer for every question: What's the arm bone called? Gluteus Maximus! Whereabouts is the heart? Gluteus Maximus!....etc.
We're keen to encourage them all to think more about running and the athletes that they know and see on television. We explained in basic terms how there are different types of muscle fibres in the human body, some of which are geared towards endurance type training and others that are more important for strength/power. We noted the long, lean appearance of Paula Radcliffe,for example, compared with the power-packed muscles of Usain Bolt.
We were pleased that most of the students (both adults and children together) had been practising the mobility sequence and we ran through this again. We had also planned to teach some other exercises, some of which were floor-based, so we asked the group to lay out some mats. Afterwards, David's words were, "we should have thought that through more. I forgot that mats make kids go ballistic". Strange, but true. The next five minutes or so were chaos as the kids dragged mats around the sports hall, shouting and screaming and mauling each other about. Eventually, we found some kind of order and channeled their energy into constructive exercises, asking them to call out the muscle names as they used them (needless to say, Sticker Man used his Gluteus Maximus every time).
As per last session, we felt exhausted but happy at the end. It's funny how you never grow out of that excitement of knowing the answer in class and one mum was almost bursting to answer a question about about tendons and ligaments. We were apprehensive about teaching adults and children together as we thought maybe the adults would be bored, but they genuinely seem interested and positive about improving their family's health.
Next week is ORGANS. We're bracing ourselves for lots of "poo" and "wee" comments.
Some of the participants are obviously very internet savvy and had discovered some fantastic facts such as the stapedius is the smallest muscle in the body (it's in the ear, by the way). Quite a few of them had come across the fact that the tongue is the strongest muscle.
Happily, one boy had found out that there are three main muscle types (skeletal, smooth and cardiac) so we ran through those as well as teaching them the basic muscles in the body. We did this by writing the names of muscles on stickers and then using our resident "naughty" pupil as "Sticker Man" (which apparently became his nickname) and asking other pupils to place each sticker on the appropriate muscle. Our little "Sticker Man" was very amused by the "Gluteus Maximus" and it's now his standard answer for every question: What's the arm bone called? Gluteus Maximus! Whereabouts is the heart? Gluteus Maximus!....etc.
We're keen to encourage them all to think more about running and the athletes that they know and see on television. We explained in basic terms how there are different types of muscle fibres in the human body, some of which are geared towards endurance type training and others that are more important for strength/power. We noted the long, lean appearance of Paula Radcliffe,for example, compared with the power-packed muscles of Usain Bolt.
We were pleased that most of the students (both adults and children together) had been practising the mobility sequence and we ran through this again. We had also planned to teach some other exercises, some of which were floor-based, so we asked the group to lay out some mats. Afterwards, David's words were, "we should have thought that through more. I forgot that mats make kids go ballistic". Strange, but true. The next five minutes or so were chaos as the kids dragged mats around the sports hall, shouting and screaming and mauling each other about. Eventually, we found some kind of order and channeled their energy into constructive exercises, asking them to call out the muscle names as they used them (needless to say, Sticker Man used his Gluteus Maximus every time).
As per last session, we felt exhausted but happy at the end. It's funny how you never grow out of that excitement of knowing the answer in class and one mum was almost bursting to answer a question about about tendons and ligaments. We were apprehensive about teaching adults and children together as we thought maybe the adults would be bored, but they genuinely seem interested and positive about improving their family's health.
Next week is ORGANS. We're bracing ourselves for lots of "poo" and "wee" comments.
Sunday, 3 April 2011
Week One
We got stuck in terrible traffic on the way to our first session and arrived with exactly zero minutes to spare. The Head Teacher led us to the sports hall to introduce us to the participants. We were expecting a collection of staring eyes and adults tut-tutting and looking at their watches. Instead, we were greeted with a somewhat reasrruring racket of screaming children running round in endless, manic circles and adults chatting happily about what they'd done today.
The Head Teacher introduced us and then left us to it. We handed out the obligatory forms for participants to fill in (medical history, allergies, injuries, etc.) and while the adults filled those in, it gave us time to build "Stan" our skeleton and organize our paperwork.
The kids hadn't seen a skeleton before and were fascinated. None were scared, thank goodness. They asked David questions while I did a head count and tried to get our lesson plan organized and run through again in my head how we wanted the session to go. We had six families which totalled sixteen people - a nice, manageable number....just.
We've decided that each session should incorporate some theory work and some practical. Our first session was all about bones. We taught the group the various roles of bones, how to keep them healthy and the names of the main parts of the skeleton. We were pleasantly surprised with the existing knowledge the kids had - they all knew calcium was essential for healthy bones and that it was found in dairy products and greens. One little boy was slightly confused but on the right lines when he informed us that we get calcium from cows......
We were also pleased at how well-behaved the kids were. Every so often, we heard "when are we doing the running?", reminiscent of the "are we nearly there yet?", but generally they were eager to learn. We breathed a slight sigh of relief at this, having watched a rather disturbing episode of Jamie's Dream School the previous evening.
Eventually the kids got restless and it was time to get everyone up and moving about. Of course, we asked everybody to take their shoes off. The kids thought nothing of it - they do their PE with bare feet anyway. There are some pretty sharp adults in the class though who ask some intelligent questions so we need to be on the ball and explain the science behind the concept of barefooting. To say that some of them were dubious about it is too strong a word - they just needed convincing, as do the majority of people, that what we've been told, or had drummed in to us, about the need for stability, cushioning etc. can and should be questioned.
We didn't do any running today but put together a little mobility routine for all the families to practise at home. We also dished out some written homework and asked them to find out five interesting things about muscles for next week's session.
All in all, a great first session. We were exhausted at the end though - give me a barefoot 10 miler any day, but this was challenge!
The Head Teacher introduced us and then left us to it. We handed out the obligatory forms for participants to fill in (medical history, allergies, injuries, etc.) and while the adults filled those in, it gave us time to build "Stan" our skeleton and organize our paperwork.
The kids hadn't seen a skeleton before and were fascinated. None were scared, thank goodness. They asked David questions while I did a head count and tried to get our lesson plan organized and run through again in my head how we wanted the session to go. We had six families which totalled sixteen people - a nice, manageable number....just.
We've decided that each session should incorporate some theory work and some practical. Our first session was all about bones. We taught the group the various roles of bones, how to keep them healthy and the names of the main parts of the skeleton. We were pleasantly surprised with the existing knowledge the kids had - they all knew calcium was essential for healthy bones and that it was found in dairy products and greens. One little boy was slightly confused but on the right lines when he informed us that we get calcium from cows......
We were also pleased at how well-behaved the kids were. Every so often, we heard "when are we doing the running?", reminiscent of the "are we nearly there yet?", but generally they were eager to learn. We breathed a slight sigh of relief at this, having watched a rather disturbing episode of Jamie's Dream School the previous evening.
Eventually the kids got restless and it was time to get everyone up and moving about. Of course, we asked everybody to take their shoes off. The kids thought nothing of it - they do their PE with bare feet anyway. There are some pretty sharp adults in the class though who ask some intelligent questions so we need to be on the ball and explain the science behind the concept of barefooting. To say that some of them were dubious about it is too strong a word - they just needed convincing, as do the majority of people, that what we've been told, or had drummed in to us, about the need for stability, cushioning etc. can and should be questioned.
We didn't do any running today but put together a little mobility routine for all the families to practise at home. We also dished out some written homework and asked them to find out five interesting things about muscles for next week's session.
All in all, a great first session. We were exhausted at the end though - give me a barefoot 10 miler any day, but this was challenge!
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