Why is Your Gym So Quiet?

Hey guys.. I am sorry it has been a while since my last post. I have been on the road visiting family up and down the east coast. I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and are getting ready for the New Year. I have a ton of new blog ideas that I am really excited to share with you. I would like to thank those of you that emailed me and made posts asking when I was going to get back on the ball and put up another post! So here you go...

Was that a pin I heard dropping in your gym? That is definitley not the sound of FUN! I understand there are times when you need and want your class to be quiet, but other times its time to turn up the music! Being in the car and over the last week I have been able to listen to a lot of music. I am the kind of person that likes all types of music. Some of the music I listen to could be used in the classroom setting and others not so much. Not because of the language just becasue of the content. I mean whether I am talking about my good ole Christian Rock or half of the Top 40 songs, someone is going to have a problem with the content of the songs.

Please do not just throw in your Jams mix or turn on the radio! You will be receiving an email, phone call, or even visit from a parent. So the question is how do you play music without offending anyone or getting a note from a parent asking where their son or daughter learned the lyrics to a certain song. To most parents the music played on your Top 40 Station is OK for their children. Others would frown upon those stations. There are three options I have come up with while searching for music for my classroom which I will get to later but first lets talk about when to use music in your classroom.

What do I use music for?

EVERYTHING! You can use music for just about anything on any given day. Here is a list of ideas of when to use music.

Use Music:

To get students excited when they walk in
As a warm up
As part of your lesson
As part of game
To stop and start stations
To dance
For Aerobics
As a cool down


I am sure there are many more ways you guys can think of or actually use music in your classroom and I would love to hear about it!

What kind of music should I get?

Option #1 Kidz Bop!

Kidz Bop... What is Kidz Bop? Kidz Bop is a brand of compilation albums featuring child session musicians performing contemporary music. The albums are composed of "kid-friendly" versions of the latest songs on Top 40 radio and are sung by young children. Now of course this option would not be popular with the middle and high school students, but my elementary students sometimes can not even tell the difference between the the "real" version and the Kidz Bop version. Kidz Bop has a all the most recent songs that you hear on the radio and even better they also record Holiday Themed music. I currently own the Halloween and the Christmas playlist.

Option #2 Go Instrumental

This is a good option for all levels. If the students not the lyrics then they can sing along, if they do not they can enjoy the music. Not only can you find top 40 songs that are instrumental, but you can also find some good mixed techno music such as David Guetta. David Guetta does a lot of the background beats and music for most of the top songs these days. Most of his stuff is upbeat and can be found with or without singing. This is great for dance units, step aerobics, and running activities where you want the students to be motivated for long periods of time.

 

Option #3 Create your own P.E. Playlist

If the first two options do not suit you do not keep your gym silent. Self select songs you like that are appropriate for your age level. You can listen to the songs and make sure that there are not any cuss words or content issues and build your own playlist.

Most of you are aware already, but with the the technology we have these days finding music is easier than ever. You do not have to run to the store and buy a full CD that has two songs you need on it and bust your budget creating your library. With sites like Apples ITunes and Amazon you can buy individual songs and build your own playlist on your computer, Apple device, or MP3 player.

PKES Family Fitness Night

Fun for the Whole Panther Community

This year our related arts team was put in charge of organizing community events through out the year. The goal was to bring parents and members of the community together with our kids while also showcasing some of the things we are doing in our Related Arts classes. My co teacher Mrs. Dillon organized a wonderful night of family fun with her Family Fitness Night. I asked her to write a guest blog entry for Innovative P.E. in hope that maybe some of our fellow P.E. teachers around the world would like the idea and try to plan events similar to hers. She did an amazing job with the event and got a lot of great feedback from parents, teachers, and students who all loved her event.

There are many reasons to have a Family Fitness Night at your school. The most obvious reason to have a Family Fitness Night is to promote the importance of being physically active, no matter what your age or skill level is. The activities that our students and their families participated in were created so that all family members could participate. Another reason to have a Family Fitness Night is to promote a sense of community within our school. Our principal is a huge advocate for community involvement as well as building a community throughout our entire school. Family Fitness Night provides students and their families an opportunity to meet other students and  families which ultimately builds our school community as a whole.

 When planning our Family Fitness Night, there were many things that needed to be taken into consideration. I first thought about who I would offer our fitness night to and eventually decided on having one fitness night for K-2^nd and another one for 3^rd – 5^th.  I then thought about where I wanted Fitness Night to take place. With the limited amount of outside space at our school, as well as unpredictable weather, I decided to use the gym. Next, I had to figure out the best way to include as many families as possible. I decided on offering two sessions that were one hour each.  In each of the sessions there were 8 stations with between 6-8 participants at each station. This allowed me to include about 130 people. After figuring out how it was going to be structured, I began to plan which stations I wanted to include and how they would be laid out in the gym. I created station explanations that were hung on the wall at each station, as well as a station map (see above picture)  that showed families how to rotate to each station. Additionally, all equipment that I was going to need had to be organized by station. This allowed for easy setup the night of the event as well as making sure that all equipment that was needed was available to be used. Finally, about two weeks before the event, registration forms were sent home with all students in K- 2^nd Grade.  As forms were returned, they were entered into a spreadsheet and then were sent a confirmation e-mail that they were registered. Once all available spots were full, all additional registrations were sent an e-mail letting them know that fitness night was completely full.

The following is a list of all activities that were participated in on Family Fitness Night:

1.      Fitness

2.      Nintendo Wii – Just Dance 4

3.      Cornhole

4.      Rock Climbing Wall

5.      Bowling

6.      Hoops and Ropes

7.      Scooter Obstacle Course

8.      Beach Ball Volleyball

Overall, I felt that our first Family Fitness Night went well. Everything seemed to flow well once the night got started.  I recommend sending out a survey after your event in order to receive feedback from the families that attended. After sending out my survey, I received several great ideas to help improve our next fitness night. Some of the feedback I received includes:

1.      Open the partition between the gym and the cafeteria so that stations can be spread out more.

2.      Have a final activity that included all families (ie: group dance/game)

3.      Using a whistle to change stations as opposed to just when the music was stopped.

4.      Having someone monitor the Wii to make sure students shared the controllers

5.      Overbook by a couple of families so that if one family does not show up we can still fill the space available.

We also had several generous companies around the Fort Mill area that donated door prizes for the kids as they left the event. Some of these companies included Publix, Family Trust, and Winthrop University Athletics. Again we owe them a big thank you for the items they donated which made Family Fitness Night that much better.

Thank you Mrs. Dillon and if you have any questions for her or  would like any extra information on this event please email me at kliebler11@gmail.com or leave a comment below. Innovative P.E. is all about sharing ideas and helping out all teachers who need a new idea or just a group of people to bounce ideas off of.

How Do You Incorporate Fitness?

Staying fit while having fun!

As a P.E. teacher, Fitness is an inportant part of our cirriculum, but how do we teach fitness in a way that students walk away thinking exercise is fun.  This would actually be a very easy task if all students liked to play sports, but this is not the case. We could set up game play for many of our envision games such as soccer, basketball, team handball and  hockey, and let them go go go.  The challenge is to disguise fitness in away that your atthletic students will find the competitive nature and your non athletic students will see  the same activty as a fun non competitive activity rather than excercise or sport.

Over the next couple of days I am going to open up the floor to you guys to chime in and give away all of your most prized secrets on fitness activities. This is the not only the season of giving, but also think about how great it feels to help some one out that really needs it. There are many teachers out there that freeze up and revert to the same boring activities that students despise. How many times can you possibly run the pacer, the mile, do mass sit ups and push ups or run relay races?

The activities you share do not have to but can be original activities. Most of the activities that any of us do have been seen or found somewhere else and modified to work for us. Why reenvent the wheel if you don't have to. I will get the ball rolling with two activities that have been a hit with our students.

Push-up Handshake

The first activity is called push up hand shake. Challenge your students to get with a partner and come up with a new super secret handshake. Tell them that their handshake must incorporate atleast 15 touches, 10 being in the push up position. Give the students 10 or 15 minutes to come up with and practice their routine with their partner. When they  have memorized and perfected  their routine, they can get with another group and perform their handshake.  Depending on if you are doing this as a warm up or an actual part of class, you can then get them to switch partners and create a new handshake.

 

 P.E. UNO

The second activity is called PE UNO. This game can be played with UNO cards that you can by at your local  bargain store or you can make your own cards. Split your students into groups where they will work togeter to make decisions. Each small group is playing their own little game and will need their own set of cards and rule sheet. One student will pick a card and the group will do what that card says.  After the whole group has completed the activity the next person in the group will pick a card. There is no end of the game so it is important to keep an eye on your students and allow water breaks as a group or as individuals.  Below are the different cards that are in the deck and what we have made them represent. 

Colored number cards - if a colored card is pulled  the group will do the exercise  represented by that color the amount of times that is on the card. 

 

Red = Push-ups

Green = Frog jumps

Blue = Curl-ups

Yellow = Mountain climbers

If a student picks a red 7 the group will do 7 Push-ups.

Locomotor cards

Skip = skip around the gym one lap

Reverse = walk or jog backwards around the gym

Special cards

Draw 2  = draw two cards and do both exercises

Draw 4 = draw four cards and do all four activities

Wild = pick any activity and do that activity

Make sure your students shuffle the cards when they reach the end of the deck and when they are finished for the day. This is important so that the next group that plays does not end up with four specialized cards in a row. Nothing like grabbing a Draw 4  followed by a draw two and have do do 17 push ups 5 curl ups  and 6 mountain climbers and 2 laps around the gym in one turn. 

Now it is your turn! . WE NEED COMMENTS!  My challenge to you  is to share your fitness best practices with everyone in the comment section. It does not have to be a long comment. If you think it is too long post something short and email me the description.  I will collect them and them post them as files on the blog in a future post that I hope to post over the Christmas Holidays that will showcase the top 10 fitness activities.

Go BIG This Holiday Season

Holiday Projector Activity

I am the kind of teacher that likes to spice things up during the holidays. My theory is that if the kids are going to be excited and anxious, then why not throw something at them that will blow them away. Holiday activities are an easy way to do this. Many of these activities can be molded to fit your classroom or changed slightly so that it is just different enough to do again.

For Halloween we tried out a new activity that my co teacher found on another blog we follow called Kinesitechnology. We tried it and it was such a huge hit that we have designed our own Christmas Holiday version to try out this upcoming holiday season. This is just a small snip-it of what this activity looks like.



The activity requires one or two LCD projectors that instantly turns the gym into an obstacle course.  We had to borrow one from a friend, but are in the process of trying to find old projectors that are not being used in the district.  We used Power Point and displayed it life size on the wall to make the animations. Students look at their shadow against the wall and try and make it across the screen without hitting any of the obstacles.

This is one of the configurations that you can use. You can

put the projectors on any wall you want so that it will work
with your gym.

Depending on how many students and how much space you have, you can use one or two projectors. We added extra obstacles (hula hoops, balance beam, scooters) on the floor between the screens so that students would be spaced out more and not have to wait in lines. The students move counter clockwise around the gym. The biggest problem I saw with the activity at Halloween was when the students got to close too the screen. If they get too close they will not be able to see the animations on the wall, which then defeats the purpose. This time, we helped out the students by putting a line on the floor to keep them the right distance away from the wall. Another thing we are really pointing out during this activity is to face the wall. When students do this, they tend to slow down and can see what they are doing more clearly. When they face sideways they tend to run through hitting all of the obstacles, because they are not able to see them as well. With these modifications and being able to do this a second time, we are expecting great things out of this activity!

Below I have provided the PowerPoint we are using for this activity. If you are looking for something new, this might be the activity for you. Just like any idea, make it work for you. (monitor and adjust) To view the PowerPoint presentation we used, click the picture below. If you decide to try this activity, use this PowerPoint or you can easily make your own for any season or occasion.



Other Obstacles We Used

Below are pictures and short descriptions we used around the gym between the two screens. These are just some we came up with using our existing equipment. The signs are made from a batting tees wrapped in streamer paper. Then, we cut out letters, glued, laminated and taped the top to the post. The snow around the bottom is just bulletin board paper. You can use old fabric or even cheap sheets for this effect too.

Students have to cross the the Seas of Swirly Twirly Gum Drops
 by walking over the balance beam one at a time then jump from
hoop to hoop on two feet.

Students have to follow the dotted line from the green line to the red.
 K-2 uses a locomotor skill of their choice, while 3-5 uses a floor scooter.

Students leap from hoop to hoop from one end of the forest to
another. You can use what ever locomotor skill you like.

If you have any questions or want to share what activities you use during the Holidays, please comment below. I encourage comments, because I love to learn too!

Tis The Season...To Get Sick!

I have been working on a few blog articles, but none of them are ready to be published quite yet. I need to record a few videos, and I am waiting on some guest blogs to be finished up. I thought I was stuck, but today I was walking in the hall and was thinking about all the runny noses, coughs, and wait how many Guest Teachers (that is was we call Substitute Teachers at my school) do we have in the building today? This got me thinking, why don't I write a quick blog about best practices when you can not be in the building.

Are You Ready?

So you wake up tomorrow morning and you feel like a truck hit you! You are coughing, sneezing, and of that achy body.  Are you ready to make the call? Now listen... I HATE to miss days, but there comes a time when you have to consider the well being of your students and fellow teachers. I am very lucky this year! I have a fantastic co teacher and we think very similar. We are trying the team teaching thing this year which has its benefits and pitfalls, but one of the benefits is that if one of us is sick the other can lead class that day while the sub helps out.

Well You Are Lucky, But What About Me?

Not all teachers are this fortunate. Either they are the only teacher at their school or teach separate classes as their co teacher. If this is the case, do you have your sub folder ready for that emergency morning? Is it visible and/or does someone know where to find it. I can tell you from experience, that is the worst feeling. Waking up feeling like that and then have to drag yourself out of bed to send in or call and tell someone where to find your sub plans. I made that mistake once and it will never happen again. It is not that I did not have sub plans, but that I was working on them and had them in my book bag at home with me.

What is in Your Folder?

OK... You have your folder... Check! It is known where it can be found... Check! Now what are your plans for the sub? Are they your actual lesson plans for that day or is it a totally different activity unrelated  to what you have been doing. We sat down this year and discussed this very topic.  At the beginning of the year we decided to teach a few easy games that practiced some of our standards and put all of the equipment needed  for those games into a mesh bag. If it is not in the bag, it is clearly visible in our storage room. This way the sub isn't runing around looking for equipment, doing any major set up, or wondering which size or type of ball to use.

 

Sub Plan Check List

These are some things that I think about when creating a sub plan:

• Do you have all your information? (Plans, Class Management, Class Rosters, Class Schedule, Emergency Plan)
• Are the directions clear enough and/or in enough detail for anyone to understand? (Draw Pictures!)
• Have you told the sub where to find the equipment needed?
• Is the activity safe?
• Will the kids enjoy the activity? (unhappy or bored kids = major behavior problems for a Sub)
• Will the sub enjoy the activity? (Are the kids screaming all day)
• Did you leave a whistle or let them know how you get the attention of your class? (most subs are in the classroom - not a gym - when they come in, so a whistle might not be part of their arsenal)

These are just a few ideas of what I feel is important to ask yourself when building your sub plans.

What do you do when you are sick? What do your plans look like?  What is your favorite activity to leave for a substitute teacher when you are sick?  I would LOVE to see some feedback! If you have something to share, click the comments link below.

So..You Think You Can Dance?

Dance What...!?!

As a young male teacher I never envisioned myself teaching dance. When I was in college and even my first year of teaching, I had already decided I was too cool to have to teach dance. I am not a good dancer, nor do I enjoy dancing in public. It really was not until this year that I found my confidence with dancing in my classroom. I don't know if it was because I was starting over at a new school or that I just realized that it the kids don't care what look like and neither should I.  From the first day of school I was dancing while we played music for our stations, (looking like a total dweeb to any outsider who might have walked by the gym) but that was that. It is not about me anymore! It is now about showing my students you do not have to be good at something to try it, nor do you have to be good at it to have fun doing it.

Some of you are thinking to yourself "what are you talking about". You  have no problem dancing in public, so dancing in front of the kids is probably a cinch. Dancing might be your thing, but I am sure you can relate with me on some level because, most teachers have at least one area where they are not as comfortable with than everything else they teach all year long. 

This year my co-teacher and I decided as a buffer between our Thanksgiving and Christmas activities we would incorporate dance into our curriculum through line dancing. We are teaching the Cupid Shuffle, Cha Cha Slide, Electric Slide, Cotton Eye Joe, and we may (depending how brave we are) try and tackle the ever so popular, yet difficult Gangnam Style dance with our older students. We chose line dancing not only because it is easily organized, but it also gives students who are not as good a place to blend in the crowd without getting embarassed unlike square dancing or partner dancing where there is no place to be just OK.

Every so often, since this blog is meant to be one that shares ideas and best practices, I will ask for help from my followers. My challenge or question to you is what kind of dance do you teach in your gym, and to those who are not teachers (or are not teachers yet), what would you teach in your gym if you had that chance?

Please click the comment link below to answer the above question!

Can Whole Brain Teaching Work in Your Gym?

Whole Brain What?

I have been teaching for three years now and I have used three different styles of classroom management. Before this year I had not found something I absolutely loved. I did however know some of things I did not want. I did not want to have to talk over students or have students raise their hand to ask a question, me stop class and them ask if they could use the bathroom.  I did not want to have to send my upper elementary students to "timeout". Oh and I definitely did not want to go home with a headache everyday with whistle echoes in my head. So it happened that when moving to a new school, the Whole Brain Teaching philosophy fell right into my lap.

Let me first say that I am not saying this is the only way or best way to teach your class, but as one of my new favorite TV characters Uncle Si from Duck Dynasty might say "Hey, It works for me Jack". What is Whole Brain Teaching? The concept of whole brain teaching is to engage a student’s entire brain, which will increase learning ability.  It is a teaching style which introduces concepts and ideas to a student in a way they are most likely to retain it as well as providing the best atmosphere emotionally which allows a greater degree of comprehension and retention. In laments terms it means that you teach or manage your class using a variety of senses and using both sides of the brain. In my class we do not use all of the WBT concepts. They just will not work in a gym setting. But as for the classroom management portion and a few other concepts, my co-teacher and I have adapted WBT in a way that works for us.

Class-Yes

The First part of WBT that we us is called "Class-Yes". It is the most simple and quickest way that I have seen to get students quiet. The teacher says "Class Class" the students then respond "Yes Yes" However you say Class Class the students respond with Yes Yes that way. For example Classidy Class turns in to Yessidy Yes. Class Sir Turns in to Yes Sir. You can even invent you own. Some that we have come up with so far are:

Teacher: Class Train, Student: Yes Woo Woo
Teacher: Class Cowboy, Students: Class Yee Haw
Teacher; Class Turkey, Students: Class Gobble Gobble.

The Five Rules

The Second part of WBT that we use is the 5 rules. Each rule is posted on the wall and has a gesture that goes with it. We call them our “5 Procedures”. The Rules are listed below followed by a video of a third grade class of mine demonstrating the motions.

Rule #1: Follow Directions quickly (the gesture: make your hand shoot forward like a fish)

Rule #2 Raise your hand for permission to speak (the gesture: raise your hand, then pull it down next to your head and make a talking motion.

Rule #3 Raise your hand to leave your seat or area (the gesture: raise your and, and then make a little walking figure with your index and middle finger.)

Rule #4 Make Smart Choices (the gesture: tap one finger to your temple as you say each word.)

Rule #5 Make your PE teacher happy  (the gesture: hold up each thumb and index finger out like an “L” framing your face; bob your head back and forth with each word and smile really big!)

Hands and Eyes

Whenever you want your students to pay close attention to an important point, say, "Hands and eyes!" Your students respond, "hands and eyes!," fold their hands and stare at you intensely.  We have found that this command is also very effective if you have said, "Class!" and your kids are not entirely focused on you when they respond, "Yes!" We use this mainly with K, 1, and 2, but I have seen this done with all grade levels.

Lines Lines Lines

The last major part of WBT that my co-teacher and I use to manage our class is Lines Lines Lines. We use this command to have students stop what they are doing and line up. When they hear lines lines lines they are to clean up what they are doing and walk to line up. We use another version of this where we say squads squads squads when we want them to walk back and sit in their squads.

Will the classroom management portion of Whole Brain Teaching work for you? Well first you have to buy into it. If you are worried that you will look silly this will not work, but then again if you are in the teaching field in general and are worried if students think your cool you might want to rethink your profession. In a later blog I will explain some of the other parts of WBT that works for us in our Gym, but if your interested right now check out the WBT website at http://wholebrainteaching.com/

Organinzed Chaos!

Is Your Chaos Organized?

How many times have you had someone come into your gym and say "OMG this looks like chaos"? Do not worry even the most organized gym will look like this at times. How could it not look like chaos when you have 20-40 students moving at the same time or doing six different stations. Most classroom teachers do not understand a gym because they have to give up a little bit of control and trust students to follow the directions given to them. I am the opposite. I go into a classroom and try not to fall asleep because there is way too much structure.  The question you may need to ask your self about your gym is "is this organized chaos or just chaos in general"?   This post will explain what we do in our Gym at PKES to keep the chaos organized from the moment students walk in the door to the moment they leave. I am going to give you a heads up early so that you are not disappointed, some of the techniques we use will be talked about later in a later post called Will Whole Brain Teaching Work in Your Gym and I will not go into a lot of detail about these specific topics in this post.

Where am I supposed to sit?



(Squad sheet for easy roll call)

 This is question that many teachers run into at the beginning of class. If you have students sit in a different place every time they come into class then you have to answer this question every single class. If students have an assigned spot to sit in, then you will hear this question asked. If we can't have desks in our gym like they are used to in their  classroom then give the students an assigned spot on the floor that they can call theirs. I have seen this done in many ways. The two most common ways are "the circle" and "squads". If you have a circle on your floor you can have your students sit on the edge of the circle. In this method the students know where to sit and you can begin teaching from the circle. The downfall that I have run into with this method is that if you wanted to use the smart or white board then you have move the students from your circle. The other issue with this method is you do not know which students are here or not here. You may know that you have 25 students in the class, but what happens if one goes missing during a drill or in transitions.

The method that I have found most effective is the "Squad Method". I need to thank my former co-teacher Rose Clawson for this idea. In this method I give my students an exact spot to sit in infront of the whiteboard. If a student is not here on a certain day the other students still leave his spot open. The squads are marked with colored tape and the students sit in their order every class. Students never have to fight over a spot, ask where to sit, and I can use my squad sheet to quickly find out who is here and who is not. To the left is an example of my squad sheet. The tape on the floor is marked exactly like the squad sheet.

Whistle or No Whistle?

For the past two years I have used a whistle. This year I was introduced to the Class-Yes system. This system is the easiest and fastest way I have seen to get students quiet. The teacher simply says Class Class and the students respond with Yes Yes. This takes some practice, but it is well worth it in the long run. I will hit a little bit more on this system in the Whole Brain Teaching post that I will be working on soon.

Can I get some Water? Can I used the bathroom?

The first thing I say to these questions are "I don't know... Can you?" I do not say this to be a jerk, but in my class if you are asking these questions, you must not know our class rules.  We are fortunate to have a water fountain in our gym. The students know there are three times you can not get water. They are anytime we are in our squads, when we the teacher is talking, and when we are lining up to leave the gym. At any other point during class the students can freely get water.

This works the same way with the bathroom. While do not have a bathroom inside the confines of the gym we do have one right outside the door. Students will raise their hand to leave their seat or area that they are in and then tell me they are going to use the bathroom. If we are not doing any of the things mentioned above and the pass is available they are free to go. They also know if they abuse this privilege it will be taken away.

Is timeout just for Kindergarten?

I use a form of timeout for all grade levels. Let me put a disclaimer on how I feel about "Timeout". I do not like to sit students out, but there are times when students need to take a break and think about what they may of done worng. Now I feel that it is important that even timeout should be grade level appropriate.

Kindergarten through Second grade uses timeout which is marked with a box on the floor with red tape. They know where it is and they know what they are and are not expected to do when they are sent there. The teacher decides when the student gets to return.

For Third through Fifth grade I use "The Penalty Box" It is essentially the same thing, in that it is the box labeled on the floor, but the rules are different. You can see the rules for the Penalty Box pictured to the right. The Penalty Box is a self timed timeout. The students go to the box and read the questions on the wall. When they feel they have served their time and have calmed down, they may find the teacher that sent them there answer a question or two and may reenter if the teacher feels the student is ready.  

Line up Ready, Set, Go!

If you use this method then you might have more students going to the nurse than going back to class. There are several methods I use in the gym to line up students. The first one is calling out different colors or articles of clothing that students might be wearing. If they have that color on then they will line up. You keep going until all the students have all lined up. The problem with only using this method is that it is time consuming.

The most important thing to rememeber when lining up students is to make sure they know what you expect. My students know if they run, they will go back, walk, and be last in line. This keeps most of my students from running over each other when lining up. Of course you have a couple of hard headed students that think they are going to get away with it, but they don't.

 The method we use most of the time is Lines Lines Lines. This is another WBT idea. The students not only have to line up, but they must repeat lines lines lines as they walk and line up. Anytime during class if they here lines lines lines they know where to line up and what to do. This has worked really well and is a very quick solution to lining up.

There are all kinds of classroom management techniques that can be used in the gym, but these are some that have worked for me.  I feel that the most important tool in classroom management is to never run out of things to do during your lesson. Most of the time if a student is off task it is not the students fault. Most of the time it is that you have them sitting still or have not challenged them enough. Always have extra activities in your back pocket so that you always have something else to throw at your students.

 I am always open for new ideas that work better and more effective. If you have other ideas that have worked for you when organizing your chaotic gym please leave a comment. This blog is not just a place for me to spill out my ideas, but to also share best practices with all Physical Educators of all ages.  

Why do I Blog?

(My Wife and I)

Why Did I Decide to Blog?

My name is Kyle and I am a Physical Education teacher in the wonderful town of Fort Mill, South Carolina just south of Charlotte. I am married to my beautiful wife Cat and we also live in Fort Mill. I have always wanted to start a blog, but could never figure out what I wanted to actually blog about. Could I blog about baseball? Yeah I could, but there are so many blogs out there on people's opinions on baseball strategy and coaching. Well I love my yard... What about that? I am not a professional landscaper by any means so who would want to hear me ramble about my yard? Oh yeah, did I mention it is winter and I don't have any money to spend on yard projects right now. I thought I was all out of ideas when one day I was looking for teaching best practices. See I am a physical education teacher and my co-teacher and I are always looking for new ideas to  better engaged  our students and of course have more fun. Well...what I found in my search was that there are very few blogs out there about P.E. and most that were out there are not kept up or lack the details that would benefit other teachers anyway. At that moment I knew I had to write a blog about the new and creative things my co-teacher and are teaching  and best practices that I have found through other teachers, conferences, and websites.

Whats the Purpose?

(Me teaching)

I hope that this blog not only is beneficial to new teachers but also seasoned veterans that are looking for new ideas. Some of the ideas and lessons that are posted will not be logical for every Physical Educator due to lack of equipment, space, or even time. Although every post may not benefit your classroom I encourage everyone to keep coming back because the next post could be the one that gives you that lesson or idea that your students, coworkers, and principal oohs and ahs over.

If you would like to contact me for any reason whether it be to ask a question, disagree, agree, or to get more information please either comment or email me at kliebler11@gmail.com.