Sep 2, Coordisports P.E. Report

Preschool September 26, 2022

Mr Shuhei comes to CGK Preschool every two weeks to lead his super fun PE lessons.
Each column will feature some insights or stories about physical development, reports for each PE lesson, and share some YouTube videos showing some physical activities that you can try at home with your child.

Expert Column

Coordination training, which we emphasize during our PE activities, has three purposes.
The first is to build the basis of movement. In arithmetic, students learn addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division in that order. If students cannot add, they cannot subtract, multiply, or divide.
In the same way, there is an order to acquire movement, such as standing, walking, jumping, and running. Coordination training is aimed at acquiring various sources of movement.
The second is building muscle and nerve circuits. Imagine that there are numerous telephone poles in the brain.
When you exercise, electrical signals pass between these poles. When the electrical signals are passed correctly, you can perform the exercise you envisioned. The second objective of coordination training is for the electrical signal to pass through accurately and quickly.
The third objective is to improve coordination. The environment in which exercise takes place is not constant. The third goal is to improve the ability to adapt to the external environment.
In my next column, I will discuss the first objective in more detail.

Jungle (3-year-old) Class Lesson Report

[Rabbit movement]
In this lesson, we did (1) rabbit, (2) gallop/skip, (3) ladder, and (4) mat exercise/iron bar exercise. Rabbit movement is to crawl on the floor with hands and feet on the floor and get into a high crawling posture. Both hands are placed in front of the body, and both feet move forward at the same time while the hands remain on the floor. This movement is repeated to move forward.
As the rabbit movement improves, vaulting over the box also improves. To simulate this, jumping jacks for toddlers are placed in the order of start, then step off. Three-year-olds can jump from one to the other without any sudden movements.
It is important for three-year-olds to enjoy various ways of moving their bodies, rather than to suddenly become specialized in using jumping jacks and other equipment. It is also easier for children to visualize the movements by adding animal names to the movements. For example, "big like a bear" or "jump with both feet like a kangaroo.
During instruction, I try to use as many specific words as possible. When practicing with the children, please also use descriptive words that can help the children to understand better.

Video: Rabbit's movement: ◯Hands and feet move in the same order at the same time, ×Hands and feet at the same time, ◎He keeps his hands far away from him
Mountain (4-year-old) Class Lesson Report

[Let's get our heels up!]
Due to the rainy weather, PE was held indoors. This time, (1) balance exercises, (2) ladder, and (3) back roll/iron bar exercises were conducted. In the indoor PE, we do balance exercises in each session. Balance exercises are movements in which two people work together to make shapes such as a bunk bed or a slide.
The purpose of this exercise is to strengthen the sense of supporting the body with the trunk, arms and shoulders. Because many of the exercises involve putting strength into the abdominal muscles, it has become possible to quickly get up from a forward roll.
The ladder is an exercise in which five rings are lined up vertically, and children jump forward to avoid stepping on the rings.
This is an exercise to jump forward without stepping on the rings. What I tell the children to do is to lift up their heels. When jumping or running, if the heel touches the ground the center of gravity is placed behind the body, i.e., on the hips. In order to jump high and run fast, it is essential to lean forward.
To achieve this, we tell the children to lift their heels.
When you see children running, you should look at their form and see if their heels are up or not.

Video: Raising heels when jumping and running｜×Jump with feet wide and heels down, ◯Jumping with feet wide and heels up｜①Goo jump, ②Gooper jump, ③Alternating between hop and jump, ④Jumping sideways with feet wide
Sky (5-year-old) Class Lesson Report

[The key is not competition, but growth]
Due to rainy weather, PE was held indoors. This time, the following three exercises were conducted: 1) jumping over your partner, 2) frog movement, and 3) vaulting box exercise/horizontal bar exercise.
The frog movement is connected to the vaulting box. The frog movement has been performed for a long time as an exercise connected to the vaulting box (see video). The children also learned two key points: put your feet before your hands and to raise your behind when jumping
In the jumping box exercise, there were two teams: the team that wanted to jump off 3 or 4 boxes and the team that wanted to jump off five or six steps.
The teachers did not decide which to attempt, but instead the children decided themselves
This was the first time the children chose by themselves but they seemed to be able to select the height appropriate to their ability. In the jumping box, we tend to place importance in the height.
However, height is not everything. What is important is to grow by breaking through the limits of what we have done in the past.
One thing I share with the children is, "Each one of you is a different person, so it's okay for you to jump from different heights. It is more important to do your best to surpass your past self.
I told them, "Each one of us is a different person, so the height we can jump is different from each other. The result is not so much the height of the jump as the individual growth." This is something that I want them to take to heart.

Video: Frog & leg spread jump: ◯Left leg in front of hand & bottom up high, ◯Left leg not in front of hand, bottom down.