By

Debra Sension-Hall,   Hellgate Middle School 6-8th

Play:

Community Playtime – It’s Good for Everyone

Topics:

Access to Healthy Foods, Community Involvement,  Physical Activity Participation

For this event, we invited students and their families to come to school in the evening for 90 minutes of physically active games. We also provided taste samples of our smoothies from our industrial grade smoothie machine.

How did students and adults work together as a team?

Students and adults comprised different teams that competed in relays and challenges. We had 20 university athletes that were donating their time for community service that also came and helped out at the event. They helped run the smoothie station and also participated in the games and relays. Our students loved competing with and against the college students. Parents also participated on teams with their kids.

How do you plan to make this Play last during the school year and beyond?

We plan to offer this event every year. I would like to consider developing a student activity week in the Fall where students come up with some of these relays, games and challenges to participate in during lunch, recess, or break. The more popular challenges would be used in the Winter FUTP 60 Family Fun and Fitness Night. This event is growing in popularity with families and students.

What challenges did you face and how did you overcome them?

One challenge that we face is the amount of set up and direction needed for our Minute-to-Win It challenges. With only 2 PE teachers at the event, it is hard to run a number of stations AND run the smoothie sample station. The university students were a huge blessing. With 20 of them on site, we could assign them stations to run and there were still students available to participate in the events. This allowed us to have a number of activities going on at one time.