Session 8, proved to be one of the hardest sessions I have ever experienced as a coach. After welcoming the group into the village hall once more, due to the random bursts of snow, the teacher approached us and asked for a quiet word. As the rest of the pupils were lining up ready to be organised into groups, the teacher informed us that one of the participants had forgotten her prosthetic leg, but still wanted to join in with her wheel chair.
The potential problem which we were now ecnountered with was that the pupil would need to be pushed around because she will also need to be holding the stick. This meant the TA had to also be in the session, escorting the pupil around.
However, we agreed as coaches it would not differ to much, we would simply just have to add time on for certain exercises. However this did not prove to be as easy as we had hoped for with the session becoming slow and lathargic down to the immobility of the pupil and TA, and it also, for some strange reason appeared to distract the rest of the group.
The whole session ended up not only a struggle with the constant changing of ideas and differentiation, but also the bahviour of the rest of the pupils was poor compared to previous weeks.
Seems like a difficult problem to overcome was you able to include this person in the wheel chair into all the activities as much as you liked?
Perhaps giving her specific roles may have helped?
Yes, we included the pupil into all of the activities throughout the session, it just appeared to be difficult with the TA having to assist her. Your idea of instead delegating her a role is a good idea Joe thanks, I’ll be sure to use it for future reference.