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Teacher: Bo Mielczak who teaches at Stallings Elementary in Stallings, NC. Bo Mielczak can be contacted at bo.mielczak@ucps.k12.nc.us.

Name of Best Practice: Fitness Lab

Rationale/Purpose of Event: To teach healthy lifestyles and to improve fitness in a before school activity.

Suggested Grade Level: 4-5

Materials Needed: Any equipment teacher can buy or make. I do a lot of fundraisers (no funds from school system), so I buy items to make the workouts interesting. Small fitness equipment: medicine balls, basketballs, mats, weights, heavy hoops, big balls, exercise bands or cords, jump ropes, abs wheel, bars, spinners, poles, cones, paper markers, and stopwatches.

Fitness Lab

The students in grades 4 and 5 take the Fitnessgram test twice a year and record their scores on the Fitnessgram card. After the fall testing, the students set fitness goals for the academic year.

The fitness lab is available Monday, Wednesday and Friday before classes start in the gym for students to work on their fitness goals. Each participating student has workout card where he/she records activities of the day. I blow whistle every 30 seconds and allow a couple of seconds for rotation. After each workout students mark the stations they worked on each day. There are a variety of stations set up with the signs and photos of activity.

Once a week the students drop a cloth clip with their number to the bucket to be entered into a prize drawing. I have a lot of prizes from the Fuel Up To Play 60 program, such as foam footballs, towels, shirts.

The following are the stations:

1. Run, jump, touch basketball net
2. Push-ups on push-up handles
3. Abdominal wheel
4. Punching bag
5. Gripper
6. Squat with medicine ball
7. Ball wrestling
8. Run, jump off the stage with medicine ball
9. Spinning in spinner
10. Ball push-ups
11. 3 lb hula hoop spin on waist
12. Wall sit with the big ball
13. Exercise band for arms and shoulder
14. Run, tramp take-off lan
15. Jump rope
16. Flexed arm hang
17. Pull-ups
18. Dips on the beam
19. Climbing a pole
20. Leg lifts on the foam box
21. Chest Lift on the foam box
22. Tuck jumps on the tramp
23. Leg lifts on the bar
24. Arm wrestling
25. Biceps curl with 5 Lb weights

I have over 40 students who have workout cards, not all of them come each day.

Teaching Suggestions/Tips:

Make sure the station fitness activities have been practiced previously.

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Posted on PEC: 2/25/2014 and has received 11 votes.

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Previous Comments:

Diane Burke

What a good idea. What a great way to keep the kids motivated about fitness and to keep the fitness Gram consistent.


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