Week Eleven

This week was by far one of my favorite classes in RTH 252 thus far! Once we began the activities I don’t think I ever stopped smiling or laughing. This week the Sports group presented. We began with a presentation from Niles from Special Olympics Wisconsin. Niles certified anyone in the class that wasn’t already and wanted to be. Next, our class broke down into pairs and did a “Blind Hike”. I was the first to be blindfolded and was led out of the Health Science Center by Trisha. Half way through our hike we switched blindfolds and I led Trisha the rest of the way to Centennial. Once we made it to our room in Centennial, we did a short debrief about the “Blind Hike”. The next activity that we did was Volleyball. For volleyball we played with four players on each team and used duct tape attached to two tables as our net. Everyone had to sit in a wheelie chair and for each game there were certain rules to how we could play. One game we could only play with our feet, another we could only use one hand, and another we could only use a close-fisted hand. We used a beach ball for some of the games and balloons for the others. We did a short debrief after this activity.

The next game that we played was “Human Foosball”. In this game there were 8 players on each team. The team was broken down into one goalie, 3 on defense, 2 middles, and 2 on offense. The object of the game was to get the ball in your opponent’s goal. The beginning rules to the game were that we all had to sit pretzel-legged on the floor and had to have one butt cheek on the floor at all times. We also could not grab the ball with our hands but could only hit it with an open, firm hand, as if your hand was a hockey stick. We used a soft, small dodge ball for this game. The next rule was that we could only hit the ball with our non-dominant hand. The last rule to the game was that we could be on our knees to move around. With this last rule, we used a beach ball and were able to pick it up and throw it to other team members, but could not let it hit the ground. We again did a short debrief after this activity. The next activity that we did was “Blindfold Dodge Ball”. In this activity there were three players on each team. One player was blindfolded, one player had their back to the course and was giving verbal directions to the blindfolded player, and the last player was facing the course and giving nonverbal directions to the player that was giving the verbal directions. The goal was to lead your blindfolded player to a ball so that they could pick it up and throw it at another blindfolded player to get them out. The last blindfolded player standing won. The facilitators then did a final debrief after this activity.

From this presentation I learned a lot of different ways of adapting games so that persons who were born without or have amputated limbs, are blind or visually impaired, or are in a wheelchair, can participate just as well as everyone else. I also learned some great new ways of adapting a “normal” game such as volleyball but with a twist. I will definitely use some of these activities that I learned in the future because I had such a great time playing them. This week I learned that I am definitely opening up more to everyone in my class and getting to know people very well. I got to show my competitive side this week, which felt great. This week my way of “striving for excellence” was to let loose, have a great time, and strengthen my relationships with my fellow classmates. What a great night!