Bowling
On Monday November 9th our 255 class met at Cort-Lanes bowling alley to begin our last teaching for our Lab D. The other two teachers and myself had reserved ten lanes for our lesson so we could have two students per lane to increase activity time for the students. Unfortunately, the men’s bowling league ran a bit longer than expected and we had to wait for them to clear out before we could get in our lanes. This allowed an opportunity for our students to get their bowling shoes and a bowling ball. I taught second so I was able to set my worksheets that I had created for the lesson under the bowling ball retrieval stations (for a closer look at these sheets check out the links at the bottom of this post). Our lessons were intended to fill 15 minutes but we had to shorten them by a few minutes to allow all three of us to teach. This meant eliminating the Wii bowling from the lesson as an option for some of the students. I began my lesson by showing a poster that introduced my cues that I was going to cover for the lesson.
In case you are unable to read my cues from the photo above, my four cues for the lesson were:
1. Low release
2. Foot swings behind
3. Fingers to shoulder
4. Hold your pose.
I felt these were important to cover to help a beginner bowler or to improve one’s bowling form. To help my students stay on task I created a worksheet that they would fill out to help improve their form and to remember my cues for the lesson. I also adapted this worksheet to suit the needs for left handed students in my class. I feel that it is important to do this rather than telling these students to do the opposite as what the directions tell them too. This will help them learn faster by reducing processing time that would be needed to figure out what is opposite for them to do. 
Next I allowed the students to work on their cues as they went to their lanes to practice rolling the bowling ball. I visited the students and gave feedback by either walking in the approach area making sure not to get in anyone’s way and looping behind to see their progress on the worksheet. In the picture above I am asking Frank what cue he was focusing on for his next roll. I was glad to see that students had been following directions and giving their partners high fives like worksheet had asked of them. Below Amy and Jack celebrate by giving a high five, while Frank and Brad look on.
I felt that I had been doing well spreading my attention to all my students but soon realized that my numbers seemed to have gotten smaller. I scanned the area as I had expected Dr. Yang to throw a loophole in my lesson. Sure enough a few of the students had ventured of to the dinning area and were about to get an early start to lunch. I headed in their direction keeping my body facing the rest of the class to ensure I did not have any other students wondering off. I addressed the students by saying I was aware it was almost lunchtime but the lesson would be over shortly and they would be able to eat soon enough.
One of the students, Mike Putnum, seemed a little reluctant because he had been frustrated that he had been rolling gutter balls. I encouraged him that I was not focusing on where the ball went rather the form of releasing the ball properly and told him we would be working on aiming in the upcoming units. I talked him through the cues, had him watch his partner, then watched as he executed well on his turn. I asked if there was anything else I could help him with before working my way back down to the lower numbered lanes.
I brought the class in towards the middle lanes and explained the modified game of 3-6-9 bowling. This is a game to help encourage less experienced bowlers because it allows them to get an automatic strike on the 3rd, 6th, and 9th frame. The papers were all ready at their lanes so they did not have to waste time waiting in line to get a sheet. The class seemed to be enjoying themselves but unfortunately the limited time cut the game a little short. I gathered the students one last time to do a closure to the lesson asking about the cues and to remind them that we are in a public place and if we would like to maintain our privileges we have to be on our best behavior and not allow any other instances of wondering off task to occur.
Overall, I felt confident and comfortable during my lesson even being short on time and having little experience bowling. I felt it was fun to be in a new environment other than the gymnasium and felt the class enjoyed my lesson. I hope to build from this and keep making my lessons fun and creative.
Take some time to check out different components of my lesson. Note I need to use a PC to update my audio. When I am able to do so my other links will be updated as well.
Hey Jason nice blog post, you just need to publish your documents so that everyone can see them
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