Grade 2 Net Games Unit (Tennis & Badminton)

Net Games - Learning Journey: Elements of Movement

 

Enduring Understanding: Constantly returning to the ready position in Tennis or Badminton is necessary for long term success.

An introduction to Net Games: Tennis & Badminton.

In the unit we explored the concept of the "ready position" and it's importance in letting the player move between the ground strokes in tennis or from offensive to defensive shots in badminton.

Essential Questions:

"What does being 'ready' look like?"

"Why do we want to consistently return to the 'ready position' in-between shots?"

 

Ground Tennis

A new game I did experiment with in this unit that I want to highlight is 'ground tennis'. Having already talked about the ready position the students we then get into a friendly and/or a competitive game of 'ground tennis'. Ground tennis is exactly what it says it is (obviously without a net).... you play tennis with a tennis ball along the ground. Everyone one can play, and you can tailor the games to the needs of the students. For example you could have a friendly rally, or a blistering competitive match, or you could make it more technical by having them try to keep the ball on a line or add in a ground shot. What you do need to stress is that after every shot they return to their starting ready position. 

Ground Tennis

During the unit we used tennis balls when focusing on technique, but we would always bring out the big bubble gum balls to have a fun rally.

Volleyball Badminton

One game I do enjoy is volleyball badminton. Again, it's exactly what it says it is. Volleyball rules but played with badminton equipment. I usually go 3vs.3 as that still leaves lots of space on a badminton court. At times the whole, you continue to serve until you loose a point is a bit hard to understand for the overly keen, but the students seem to love it! You can also play this game with or without net.

 

Reflections on their Adventures in Tennis & Badminton

 

G2 Net Games: Coaching & Feedback/Tennis

An Inquiry into how peer coaching and constructive, timely feedback can help a friend develop their understanding and skills in the net game, Tennis...

Hand-Eye Coordination and the introduction to 'Feeding the Ball' and the Forehand 
The unit begins with an introduction to the tennis ball, and we run through simple hand-eye coordination drills to warm ourselves up e.g. patting the ball up in the air with our hands, or playing hand tennis with a partner. After the introduction to the tennis ball we simply replace our hands with a simple bat - still focusing on our movement and hand-eye coordination.

During these first couple of lessons the importance of a well fed ball is highlighted and discussed. Without the well fed ball, learning to develop the ground strokes in tennis would be incredibly difficult to achieve.

We finish the lesson with the introduction to foot movement and the forehand using the concept of preparation in the form of drawing a giant letter C and where we need to move our bodies to make the shot easier to play (step towards/away from the ball).

Over the course of the next three lessons we moved from hand-eye coordination drills with no rackets, to adding rackets, to feeding a ball, to developing forehand and backhand strokes - see the photo pin boards below.

Photo Pin Boards from the first three lessons:

Peer Coaching & Peer Learning

As a class we have studied the ground strokes in some detail. We've looked at how they are played, when they are played and simple drills to help us improve both our forehand and backhand strokes. 

The next step is having the class rank themselves on a continuum - World Class Players all the way down to Beginners. The students are usually very good at knowing what their ability is compared to their peers. Once the students are stood on the continuum I try to pair up the more experienced with the least experienced. 

We look at what is good feedback for the coaches, and we examine how we should behave as a learner when a peer is giving us feedback. In addition we also highlight that the learning shouldn't be one way, and that the coach has lots to learn from the peer student he/she is helping.

This works really well, as it gives the peer learner lots of one-on-one time with a friend who can feed the ball accurately to them and give them little pointers that may need correcting. For the peer coaches it really forces them to break down the ground strokes, identify problems and to problem solve them in order to help their class mate improve.

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