10 Gymnastics Lesson Plans for 5-7 Year Olds

By P S Quick

These ten gymnastic lessons are designed to motivate children to develop their fundamental movement skills. They will help them to develop positive attitudes that enable them to become more confident and competent in their agility, balance and co-ordination while working alone or with others.
Each lesson includes lesson objectives, a list of resources, a warm-up activity, an introductory floor work activity, suggestions for activities using apparatus and a cool-down activity. There are also ideas for extension activities, assessment cues and ICT opportunities with web links where appropriate.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AUK Academic
• Release date: Jun 25, 2014
• ISBN: 9781783338177

Book preview

appropriate.

Lesson 1

Using Space Safely

Learning Objectives and Outcomes

Children will learn to use the workspace safely and efficiently

They will perform basic skills when travelling and also being still.

They will describe their own movements and observe, describe and copy the movements of others.

Resources

A hoop for every child.

Warm-up

Have children sitting on the floor near to you. Ask children if anyone knows why they should warm up their bodies before exercise. Ensure they understand the need to warm up muscles gently before strenuous exercise so the body is not injured.

Discuss how children can find and sit in a space without being too near to each other. Suggest children could stretch out their arms and turn round gently before they sit down. Practice finding a space two or three times by walking. Give the command ‘Walk to a space.’

Continue the activity but change the way the children move, perhaps jogging and then using more strenuous movements such as running or jumping as they warm up.

Floor Work

Tell children they are now going to think about using the space safely. When they move they need to make sure they do not go too close to anyone else or make contact so they need to be watching at all times as they move.

Explain children are going to move in different directions around the room moving only on their feet. If they meet someone they need to move to the side before continuing in the same direction. Give instructions to move forwards, sideways, backwards. Encourage children to use different movements as they do this, such as walking, jogging, jumping and running.

Give children opportunities to move using different pathways such as running in a straight line, a zigzag, or in a curve. Remind children about moving into a free space rather than a crowded area.

Apparatus

Ask children to take a hoop and sit down inside it in a space. Tell children to find as many different ways to move around their hoop as they can. On the command ‘Stop’ they should sit inside their hoop. Give children a few minutes to do this then choose two or three children to describe what they did and demonstrate their movements to the other children.

Now ask children to find different ways of moving into and out of the hoop. Allow time for children to find different ways then again ask two or three children to show what they have done. Pick out children who have used different parts of their bodies or different movements. Give children a few minutes to copy some of these different ways or invent more of their own, improving the quality and control.

Challenge children to find ways of moving from one side of the hoop to the other without any part of their bodies touching the