Let’s ‘Play to Learn’
Encourage the children to:
- Play in two small teams. Each team sets out a home den and places a set number of items as their ‘treasure’.
- Both teams try to ‘take’ one another’s treasure.
- Decide on the rules of the game, e.g. only allowed to ‘take’ one piece of treasure at a time. If tagged by opposite team – they must go back to the home den. If tagged by opposite team when holding a piece of treasure – they must give the treasure back and return to the home den or be ‘stuck in the mud’ and freed in some way by their team mates, etc.
- Play for a set time and then count the treasure in each home den – the team with the most treasure wins.
Safety & Organisation
Ensure:
- the surface is clean and free from obstructions
- there are small teams to begin with, gradually increasing team size and space available
- there is no contact other than ‘safe’ tagging – on the back
Opportunities to
- work safely with others when using equipment
- talk about what they and others have done
- make simple suggestions to improve performance
- sustain activity over longer periods of time
- describe how exercise affects the body
Questions
- What rules did you make up?
- Who collected the most treasure for your team?
- Did your team discuss tactics? What did you discuss?
- What are you going to do to try and be more successful next time?
- What happened to your breathing the longer the game went on?
Can you see the child?
- Working safely with others when using equipment
- Talking about what they and others have done
- Making simple suggestions to improve performance
- Sustaining activity over longer periods of time
- Describing how exercise affects the body
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Most of the time
Encourage the child to:
- play against more children
- play in a smaller area
- introduce more complex ways of ‘taking’ treasure
- take on a leadership role as captain of the team
- work for longer periods of time
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Sometimes
Encourage the child to:
- practise running and dodging – refer to Technical Skills Cards
- work with a partner and play against one other child initially
- set up a ‘safe zone’ that they can enter as appropriate and not be tagged
- discuss ideas with a partner on how they might be more successful
- work for shorter periods of time and take longer breaks in between ‘steals’