Flex-It February (Gilman)

Flex-It February was a fitness incentive for my K-4 students that I ran at Gilman during the month of February to promote upper body strength.

At the end of January I informed my students that we would be starting a new fitness challenge  starting the first week of February, and that for this fitness challenge they would be tested on how many shoulder taps they could complete within 20 seconds. To do this I had my students partner up and set up a row or two of tumbling mats. Once everything was set up one partner would get in a pushup position over the mats while the other was facing them. Once the timer began, the student in the push up position would take turns with each hand reaching up and across their chest to touch their opposite shoulder and then come back down while their partner counted. Once the time had ran out they would check with each other to make sure they had the same number (with the counter having the final say) and then the partner counting would report to me before resetting and getting ready themselves.
As with other challenges we had done in the past they would be working towards a goal (see Corevember for more details) both as an individual class and as an entire elementary, and I informed them that if they wanted to reach these goals they would need to practice outside of school. Once we had established a baseline score and set up our individual class goals for the month I made two separate posters for us to keep track each week. One of these posters was for the individual class goals, and the other was for the school goal which I had set. If every class were able to reach their individual goal and they succeeded in reaching their K-4 goal I told them that the 4th graders would be able to pick something ridiculous for me to do for a day. In addition, I created a "leader board" where the top 10 boys and top 10 girls K-4 would have their scores posted each week after testing. I had several of these leader boards around the school and this greatly increased the students' drive to get better.
Overall the students once again far exceeded my expectations and succeeded in reaching their individual goals and K-4 goal. As a result, the 4th graders decided that I would need to shave my hair into a Mohawk, spray it purple, and wear a fake beard for a full day. Though my hair ultimately turned out to be more pink, the kids still loved it and we all had a great time.

                                           Progress after Week 1                                     Final scores almost in

                          Final Leader Board Scores                          The students' reward for making their goal