Sporting News

Even though the past two weeks have been quiet on the external school sports, things were hotting up on the internal St Joseph’s Mini Olympics.

Last Wednesday we had our Ultimate Frisbee Competition. This provided a challenging opportunity for our students as many hadn’t had a chance to play a game of this nature in the past. It has also highlighted that a potential Frisbee skills unit needs to be incorporated in future Physical Educations lessons. 

The modified game required the students to pass the Frisbee up and down the field and throw it to their team mate in the in goal area to score. The students were all engaged and continued to persist with the new skill even in the tough conditions of wind gusts. After their rounds were completed, they pleased with the results and were excited by the new sport. 

This Wednesday we had our final round of Olympic Challenges with this weeks focus being on the Paralympics. We played a modified version of GoalBall. Goalball is a team sport played indoors by athletes with vision impairment. The object of the game is to roll the ball into the opponent’s goal while the opposing players try to block the ball with their bodies. 

Bells inside the ball help orientate the players by indicating the direction of the oncoming ball. With our team bandanas we used them as blindfolds and the students had a real life experience of what it would be like to be visually impaired. Some students made the comment that this would be such a difficult way to live and expressed their gratitude for having full vision at the completion of the game. All students took this challenge on board and played fairly and respectfully which is too be highly commended. 

The staff had some great little chuckles too as we watched our students work together in teams to solve problems and apply tactics to their games without being able to see each other. 

What was highly evident was the demonstration of team work and leadership in the face of adversity from our kindergarten students all the way to Year 6. Well done kids!

As we have completed our challenges we will now tally our medals and have a closing ceremony next Wednesday the 4th of September. Students can come to school that day in Green and Gold as we acknowledge the efforts of our Australian Olympians and

 Paralympians.