Wrestling and Hand Shakes

Tuesday 12th February,

Today we continued our parent/teacher interviews, these interviews are supporting our program and teaching us a lot about the children.

Ambrose's mum shared an insight into Ambrose's interests, "he loves wrestling"

The little things that we may not know about a child can make a great difference to that child's day at preschool, by including each child's interest increases their sense of value and shows them that they have a voice.

The wrestling began outside with Asher, Ambrose and Malu. I became involved to demonstrate some possibilities like pinning your opponent and counting to 3... We spiced things up with a sock and began the fast paced sock wrestle....

Sock Wrestling: One opponent wears a sock, the other has to remove the sock from their opponents foot. They cannot leave the wrestle mat and have a limited time to retrieve the sock.

Our outside wrestling match drew a lot of onlookers so for group time today we spiced things up and had a sock wrestling marathon. Conan and Malu were first and very fast. They raced around the 'Rainbow Wrestling Mat'.... to no avail. It was deemed a tie, with both boys happy to reach this outcome we partook in a customary hand shake and a compliment: "Good Game"

This act of good sportsmanship and kindness was a novelty for the boy's who seemed to find the idea of a hand shake foreign and new? They smiled at each other and seemed to bond through this experience.

Next up: Tegan and Amelia... Well this was interesting, Amelia finds the idea of wrestling foreign and new... she cautiously crawled around after Tegan... Tegan had the idea..evade, evade, evade. She was ready to rumble when Amelia got close and their chase drew on for a while. The cheering audience added to the excitement and encouraged the two girls to keep on keeping on!

(Notice how the children are yelling out "Go, go, go" They became so enthralled that in the next photo they jumped up and began cheering)

Finally it was called a draw and Tegan let Amelia take the sock, Amelia dramatically grabbed the sock off and the crowd went wild... They shook each other's hand and said: "Good Game" Their were no sore losers and this hand shake thing seemed to be helping...

Another handshake for the weary wrestlers....

Summer and Gracie shaking hands after a vigorous wrestle


A link to Ambrose and Asher wrestling...

https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/instantupload/5843961024140756594

Who would of thought that wrestling, a usually aggressive sport could promote such 'sportsmanship' 'comradeship' and provide an opportunity to teach children how to be respectful to their peers.