Monday, January 10, 2011

Football in the Classroom

What an eye opener to create a large-scale football field in a high school classroom for students with Autism.  Thought it would be a good opportunity to review basic math facts and support academic goals (how many feet in a yard?) but that turned out to be a little too difficult for the students.  So, it ended up more of a fine motor, motor planning and language assessment session. 

The speech-language pathologist prompted me in how to phrase questions and when to just hold still and wait, without talking, after I asked a student to do something.  It's real hard not to hand a student the glue stick as you ask them to glue down one of the yellow yard lines.  I'm supposed to ask them to do it and wait, silently, for them to ask me for the glue stick.

Several students needed physical assistance to stabilize the yard stick as they drew 30" sidelines.  The fun at the end was gluing "spectators" and team players around the border of the field.  The SLP wore a Green Bay Packers No. 80 jersey and we happened to have a photo of the player in our collection of newspaper clippings.

 I pre-made a partial field from a grocery bag as a model for the students.
 Then, we made a field from scratch--30" wide by 15" high.
 Students lightly traced guide lines to mark where the yellow yard lines would go, then placed glue over (or at least near) the guide lines.
 The goalposts were made from recycled grocery bag handles.
Much different activity working with a group compared to working 1-1 with a student!

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