Welcome Back!

Welcome Back Gators!

I have really enjoyed catching up with all of our Glengary Gators this past week after our summer vacation!  And it has also been great to get a chance to meet our newest Gators as well!  For those who don't know me, my name is Bob Vogt and I will be your child's P.E. teacher this year.  This will be my 5th year teaching Physical Education at Glengary Elementary, and my 18th year as a P.E. teacher in Walled Lake.  As your child's  teacher, it is my goal to help instill a love of movement and physical activity and encourage them to be physically active both in and out of school.  As your child learns new skills in P.E. throughout the year, please encourage them to to share these with you and try them out at home as well.  Maybe you could even start a family fitness night!  I am really excited for all of the great things we are going to do at school this year.  I look forward to working with you to help your child build a foundation of skills that will help them to be physically literate, active, and healthy for a lifetime!

                                      

GLENGARY P.E. ON TWITTER

Are you a Twitter user?  If so, you can follow me on Twitter @GlengaryPE.  I have found that Twitter is a great tool to give parents a quick snapshot of what the kids are doing in the gym when they come to PE.  I try to tweet pictures and/or video of students on a daily basis throughout the year.  If you choose to follow me, this is a school account and I only post things that are associated with Glengary Elementary and our Physical Education program.  Please also be aware that I follow the forms that you filled out at the beginning of the year as it pertains to posting your childs image/photo.  If you indicated that you do not want your child's image displayed on the internet, I will not post a picture of your child.  If you are not a Twitter user, I hope you will check it out and think about following along!

Below are the days your son/daughter will have P.E. this year.  Please help them be mindful of these days so that they can come to school with appropriate clothes/shoes for participating in P.E. on these days.  Students should wear clothing that they feel comfortable moving and exercising in and all students will need a pair of tennis shoes to wear when they come to the gym.  Here are the days that each class has Physical Education:

• Kindergarten - Tuesday, Thursday, Friday
• 1st Grade - Monday, Tuesday, Friday
• 2nd Grade - Tuesday, Thursday, Friday
• 3rd Grade - Monday, Wednesday, Friday
• 4th Grade - Monday, Wednesday
• 5th Grade - Monday, Thursday

         Contacting Mr. Vogt

Please feel free to contact me any time if you have any questions, or concerns, or would like to chat about your child's participation in P.E. You can reach me at:

Phone: (248) 956-3145

Email: Robertvogt@wlcsd.org

Twitter: @GlengaryPE

Best of luck to everyone for a GREAT school year!  And remember:

You are not fully educated, until you are Physically Educated!

Fall Fitness At Glengary Elementary

Follow Glengary P.E. On Twitter!

For those of you who use Twitter, you can now follow our P.E. program @GlengaryPE.  Please follow us and look for the occasional tweet about some of the cool things our students are doing when they come to the gym for Physical Education!
Click on the "Follow Us On Twitter" button below to visit our site.

Fall Fitness Testing

We got off to a great start in P.E. this fall!  After spending the first couple of classes getting to know one another, we jumped right into our fall fitness testing.  Students in grades 2-5 worked on completing our annual fall fitness tests. Each of the students in grades 2-5 were assessed in the areas of Cardiovascular Fitness (timed jog), Abdominal Strength (1 minute sit up test), Upper Body Strength (flexed arm hang), and Speed/Agility (shuttle run).  The students kept the data from each of their tests on their own Fall Fitness Test log.  Once the tests were completed, the students were able to bring their sheets home to share with you.  There are just a couple of classes who need to finish up still.  So if you haven't seen your students fitness test scores yet, you will soon.  But in the mean time, feel free to ask them how they did!  The students will continue to work toward achieving their grade level benchmarks throughout the year and they are encouraged to practice these things at home as well.  Cardiovascular endurance is a great thing to practice at home.  Students can work on jogging continuously without stopping as they try to reach their grade level goal.  The benchmarks for each of the grade levels is listed below:

Timed Jogging Goals By Grade Level:

K - 4 minutes          1st - 6 minutes       2nd - 8 minutes  

3rd - 10 minutes     4th - 12 minutes     5th - 14 minutes

  

While all of our students in grades 2-5 were working on completing their fitness tests, the students in grades K-2 worked on activities that help them to understand personal space/spatial awareness in order to move about the gym safely.  We have also been focusing on gross motor skill development, working on moving with correct form while running, skipping, and galloping.

Soccer / Kicking Unit

As we wrapped up all of our fitness testing, the students began the month of October working on lead up skills for the game of soccer.  We focused specifically on dribbling and kicking with correct form.  All of our students in grades K-2 participated in various games and activities that focused on the skills of dribbling/kicking while our 3-5 students were able to apply these skills while playing games of soccer.  

Components of Physical Fitness: Muscular Strength

There are 5 components that define physical fitness.  The first component that we have addressed this year is muscular strength.  Glengary students spent last week learning about the importance of maintaining strength and how it is not only good for your health, but can also help to make us better at many of the games and sports we like to play. Throughout the week students enjoyed warm up activities using light dumbells and plyometric (body weight) exercises, participated in strength building exercise circuits, and worked on upper body strength by getting an opportunity to climb the climbing rope and rock wall. 

Weekly Health Wrap Up

At the end of the students last class of the week, we typically spend the last 5-10 minutes learning about a bone or muscle in the body, or a weekly health topic.  Typically, we will cover a bone or muscle in one week, and a health topic the next.  So far this year, our students have used our skeleton, Mr. Bones to learn about the location, and function of bones such as  the skull, vertebrae, ribs, and clavicle.   We have also covered health topics such as the why we wear proper footwear for exercise and also about the importance of getting a good night's sleep and how it impacts the way we function and learn at school.  

*Below is a short video demonstrating some of the things your students have been working on over the past few weeks.  Feel free to turn the sound up on your computer and enjoy!

See you next month!

WELCOME BACK GATORS!

I had a great time reconnecting with all of our Glengary students last week and also enjoyed getting to meet our new Gators as well!  For those of you who are new to Glengary, my name is Bob Vogt and I will be the student's P.E. teacher this year.  I am looking forward to a great year teaching all of our Glengary students about the importance of fitness, exercise and making healthy choices.  I plan on using this blog to keep parents and families up to date on all the cool things your students are doing in their Physical Education classes!  And one of my goals is to also begin using Twitter on occasion this year as well.  I would like to include photos and videos of students working in the gym from time to time this year.  I will be sending a note home with all students this week with a little more information about this.  If you do not want your child's photo/image used on the blog, or Twitter, please return the note to school and I will make sure I do not use any photo's with your child's image in any of my posts.

Your Student Has P.E. On The Following Days:

KINDERGARTEN:  Monday, Wednesday, Thursday

FIRST GRADE:  Monday, Thursday, Friday

SECOND GRADE:  Monday, Tuesday, Thursday

THIRD GRADE:  Monday, Tuesday, Friday

FOURTH GRADE:  Tuesday, Wednesday

FIFTH GRADE:  Wednesday, Friday

This year, your child will come to the gym for P.E. 2 or 3 times per week depending on their grade level.  Students in grades K-3 have Physical Education 3 times each week while students in grades 4-5 come to the gym twice a week.  On the days that your son or daughter has P.E. they will need to have clean tennis/gym shoes in order to participate in class.  Sandals, crocks, flip flops, boots, etc. are not appropriate for running and playing in the  gym.  Having appropriate shoes is important for the safety of the students and it also helps to keep the gym floor in good shape.   Recently there have been a couple of types of shoes that have been popular with students that are not safe for wearing in the gym.  Any shoes that have wheels (even though they are detachable) on the bottom or spinning discs on the toes (Bella Ballerina's By Sketchers) are not allowed in

the gym.  They cause students to fall and get hurt and also scratch

the gym's hardwood floor.  If your child does not have gym shoes on a day that they come to the gym for P.E. they do have the option of borrowing a spare pair from me so that they are still able to participate.

*I am not asking anyone to go out and spend $ on new shoes...but if you do happen to be shoe shopping, please consider velcro shoes if your child does not know how to tie their own shoes.  And in the mean time, if you can spend some time teaching your student to tie their shoes, it will save all of their teachers lots of time at school and it installs a great sense of pride and accomplishment for your child!

How Can You Contact Mr. Vogt?

The best way to contact me during the school day is via email.  You are always welcome to email me with any questions or concerns at Robertvogt@wlcsd.org

And you can also reach me on my school phone at (248) 956-3145.  But since I am teaching during the day, I do not get to check my voice mail as often as I check email.   And as always you are welcome to post comments on my P.E. Blog as well if you like.

Thanks for checking out the latest edition of my P.E. blog and I look forward to sharing more news, pictures, and videos of our great students very soon!

Field Day Volunteers Still Needed

FIELD DAY VOLUNTEERS STILL NEEDED

FRIDAY, MAY 9th

This Friday is our annual Field Day!  For those that are new to Glengary, Field Day is a day filled with lots of fun, outdoor events for the kids to celebrate many of the skills they have learned throughout the year in P.E.   Thank you to those that have volunteered already, but we are still looking for people to help run or events.  If you haven't yet signed up to volunteer but would like to, we could definitely use your help!  Please click on the link below to visit our sign up genius website to volunteer for the event.

Field Day Sign Up Genius:

http://www.signupgenius.com/go/30E0A4CA8A92CA46-field

PEDERSEN FITNESS CHALLENGE

Over the past three weeks, our students have pitched in to raise donations to help former Glengary P.E, teacher Kirk Pedersen.  In the fall of 2008, Mr. Pedersen suffered a fall and became paralyzed from the shoulders down.  Since his accident, Kirk has gone through years of therapy, medical treatments, and surgeries which have posed quite a financial challenge for the Pedersen family.  So this year, instead of conducting our annual Jump Rope For Heart Event, we decided to instead collect donations and hold our first ever "Pedersen Fitness Challenge" in honor of Mr. Pedersen.  

During our fitness challenge all Glengary students got to come to the gym as a class to participate in some fun, fitness oriented challenge stations.  The students had a ton of fun and worked up a great sweat at seven different challenge stations including:

• Basketball Hot Shot
• Scooter Triathlon
• Beach Ball Volleyball
• 1 Minute Sit Up Challenge
• Wii Bowling
• Partner Jump Rope
• Lap Running

It was a fun week for all of us, and the students have really rallied around the idea of helping out a fellow Glengary Gator.  So far students have raised over $3,000 in donations!  If you would like to donate to this great cause, we will be continuing to collect donations through Friday, May 9th.  You can also contribute donations to Mr. Pedersen's Recover Fund online by visiting his fundraising page at:

https://m.helphopelive.org/find-a-patient/profile/index.cfm/patient/E73069C6-E5D6-D101-2FF71A4EFF97AB96

Click on the video below to see Glengary students participating in the Pedersen Fitness Challenge!

Gators Use Ipads To Improve Catching

One of the skills that our students have been working on this spring is catching.  During our catching unit the students participated in various games and activities to practice their catching.  We have also practiced catching numerous objects including bean bags, noodles, baseball size balls, and footballs, just to name a few.  We also spent one of our class times using the ipads to do some peer teaching and assessing.  Students worked in groups of 3 and took turns throwing, catching, and using the ipad to video tape each other.  After taking turns at all three jobs, students then got a chance to sit down with the ipad and a catching rubric to watch and critique their catching.  This was really cool as students got a chance to watch their own catching, and also offer feedback to the other members of their group.  It was a great opportunity for some peer teaching!

Below is a video of some of our students using the ipad and the catching rubric to evaluate their catching.

Drop Everything and Read

With Mrs. Grinnell

 In order to celebrate Reading Month, Mrs. Grinnell's students got to have a "Drop Everything And Read" day during one of their P.E. classes!  First grade students got to participate in stations using things like scooters, playground balls, and hula hoops.  While the students were playing at their stations, they would occasionally get the "Drop Everything and Read" signal and students would stop what they were doing, pick up a book and spend some time reading either on their own or with a friend.  Great idea Mrs. Grinnell!


Thanks for checking in again for the latest edition of our Glengary P.E. Blog.  I am looking forward to updating everyone on our fundraising totals and sharing some Field Day pictures in our next edition.  See you soon!

February 13, 2014

2nd Marking Period

F.A.P.E.S. Report Cards

While we are assessing students on skills throughout the school year, Art, Music, and P.E. teachers contribute grades to the students report cards during the 2nd and 4th marking periods.  The second marking period report cards were posted to skyward last week.  Often times, people miss the grades/comments given by the F.A.P.E.'s teachers because they are at the very end of the report card on the page AFTER the classroom teachers comments for the marking period.  If you haven't had a chance to look at your child's P.E. report card yet, you can do so by clicking on the link below and logging into Skyward.

Click here to log into Skyward Family Access to see your child's P.E. report card!

Digital Learning Week

This past week, many teachers participated in Walled Lake's Digital Learning Day/Week.  The idea behind Digital Learning Day was to find creative and meaningful ways to incorporate technology into the students daily lessons.  In P.E., the students got to enjoy several stations that incorporated the use of technology when they came to the gym.  The two favorite activities were the Wii exercise station and the use of the "Virtual Active" Ipad app that allowed students to take a virtual run through the Grand Canyon!  Other forms of technology that students got to experiment with included the use of digital heart rate monitors, pedometers, video assessment Ipad apps, and an interactive website that allowed them to test their knowledge of the skeletal system.  The students had a ball using the various forms of technology and are looking forward to continuing to use some of these tools on occasion during P.E.

At one station students used heart rate monitors to see how jumping rope influenced their heart rates.

These students are taking an online, interactive "Bones Quiz"

Students are exercising with the wii game "Hollywood Workout".

Students are using an Ipad during P.E. to take a "virtual run" through the Grand Canyon!

P.E. Winter Olympics

This week during P.E., the students have had a chance to compete in our Glengary version of the Winter Olympics.  During class this week, students entered the gym to the sounds of the Olympic Theme music.  They were divided into countries/teams and competed in various events including the Olympic Torch relay, Carpet Square Ice Skating, The Olympic Ring teamwork challenge, and Scooter Bobsledding.  And since the Olympic Games are built around the idea of good will and sportsmanship, we celebrated the winning team by playing their country's national anthem while the rest of the students gave them congratulatory high fives!  Below are a couple of short videos of some of the events.

Scooter Bobsled Racing

Olympic Ring Team Challenge

Don't Sit, Get FIT!

I am issuing a challenge to our Glengary students this week as we go away for.  Each student is bringing home a vacation exercise journal that they may use while we are off next week.  Students who decide to participate are asked to log the types of physical activity that they do each day along with the number of minutes.  For example, on Saturday someone might write, Sledding 45 minutes.  Students will use the calendar provided to keep track of their minutes of exercise/activity and total them up at the end of the vacation.  When we return, students will turn the papers in to me by Feb. 25th.  The class that accumulates the most minutes of activity during the break will earn an additional 30 minutes of P.E.time with Mr. Vogt!  

I will be looking forward to reading about all the different activities you did while we were off.  Have a GREAT VACATION!

January P.E. News

What's Happening In P.E. This Month?

Hello Gators and thanks for tuning in for the latest P.E. Blog entry.  I apologize that I missed sending out an entry in December but the month got busy and before I knew it were were out of school for the break.  

For those of you who do not know, Linda Grinnell is the second P.E. teacher here at Glengary.  She travels to our school and teaches the first grade and fourth grade classes on Thursday afternoons.  She also volunteers time at Glengary to work with many of our other students on brain gym activities.  The following is a message from Mrs. Grinnell:

Dear Glengary Families,

I’m thrilled to be back at Glengary Elementary, teaching on Thursdays  - our wonderful first and fourth graders!  I will also be volunteering on Wednesdays –again working with our students, in small groups - sharing Brain Gym activities.

Mr. Vogt and I are working together to present some exciting

lessons that valuable physical fitness and healthy lifestyle content, and fun activities for our entire building. 

A little bit about myself...I am originally from Ohio, and have lived here in Michigan for the last 24 years.  I am a proud Eastern Michigan University graduate, and am currently finishing my Masters degree through Western Michigan University – with a concentration in Adapted Physical Education.   I also received a Culinary Arts degree from Schoolcraft College, so I do enjoy cooking and baking!

I am married to a great guy, and have two children, in college.

We enjoy: traveling, working on our home, gardening, playing with our dogs, and all types of sports!

My goal is to inspire your child to initiate or continue healthy lifestyle choices – keeping physically active for a lifetime!

If you need to reach me, please contact me at LindaGrinnell@wlcsd.org.

Glengary Students Celebrate Diversity in P.E.

At the beginning of the month, we continued with our celebration of "Diversity Week" by learning about some traditional games from other countries and cultures from around the world.  During this time we learned and played some games from places like China, Greece, England, Ghana, Russia, and Native America.  We also learned a few facts about each of these countries and cultures.  For example we learned that the Great Wall of China is about 1,000 miles longer than the distance from New York to California!

Can Your Child Tie His/Her Shoes?

Having shoes tied properly is an important safety factor for kids moving and playing in the gym.  Does your student know how to tie his/her shoes?  We could definitely use your help with this one!  It often takes a big chunk of time away from our P.E. classes and/or classroom instruction when there are lots of shoes to be tied.  So if your child has tie shoes but has not yet learned how to tie, please take some time and work with them on this skill.  It is great practice for developing important fine motor skills and it will give your child a huge sense of pride and accomplishment once they are able to do this on their own!  And once they know how to tie, they always get a kick out of helping to tie the shoes of others who do not know how (and it is a big help for me!).  Below is a picture that you or your child can use for a reference to practice with and we THANK YOU in advance for your help as well!

Fitness and Nutrition Week

After completing our mini unit of games from around the world, we spent a week working on various fitness activities and learning about proper nutrition.  The students participated in lots of fun fitness stations and also played a couple of games that helped students to learn about eating a balanced meal using the MyPlate concept.  We also talked about how some foods are "fuel" for your body and are really important, and some foods are "junk" which we also called "sometimes" foods.  With the younger students in grades K-2 we talked about various snack foods that we sometimes eat and what might be healthier alternatives.  During one activity, the students had to write a healthy food choice on the board to get back into the game after being tagged by a "Junk Food Monster".  Here is one of the "lists":

In a similar activity, Kindergarten students had to go "shopping" to trade their junk food snack in for a healthy alternative.  They had to "pay" for their shopping items with exercises.  The students then had to sort the various foods into healthy, and less healthy columns.

Our 3-5 grade students learned about building balanced meals using the Myplate template.  We talked about the importance of eating a balanced meal, and while that may not happen at every single meal, it is a great goal to strive for.  During one of our class activities, students had to go on a scavenger hunt to find the necessary food items to build a balanced meal.  The team that was able to correctly categorize each food item and fill their place mat first was the winning team!  Afterwards we debriefed about many of the food items that the teams had and which category each item belonged in.

While we learned about the importance of eating healthy meals, we also continued to focus on the important role that daily exercise plays in maintaining a healthy lifestyle.  And while the students are always working on various exercises and physical activity, we took some time during these lessons to incorporate some new and unique activities to help build both strength and endurance.

The slide show below has some pictures of our Gators having fun with some of our activities this past month.