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Joe’s story – In off the backboard: Part 2

Having undergone the training for his Level 1 basketball qualification in February, it was crunch time this weekend for Joe Keenan, the Community Engagement Manager at the Tony Blair Sports Foundation. Here he explains how his assessment for the qualification went.

After being taught how to deliver basic skills training, I had been set a lot of homework before I could take my exam and progress to hopefully qualifying as a Level 1 coach. The course assessment involved some written work that needed to be submitted, answering questions on child protection procedures, the role of a coach and the rules of the game. But the big part of preparation for the assessment was actually preparing a 45 minute lesson plan – and then having the confidence to deliver it!

Having swotted up and prepared, I arrived at Manor College Hartlepool rather nervously on Sunday morning for my practical exam and assessment. As I parked up outside the sports hall I realised I had made my first mistake. I had left my whistle at home! Not a good start. I would have to borrow one to deliver my session.

To begin with we needed to ensure that health and safety was properly observed. So we toured the sports hall, making notes of hazards like misplaced exercise mats, benches and goal post. Recognising where the first aid room or facilities were and appropriate contacts identified incase of problems.

Then entered the children who we were to work with. A group of year 8 pupils from Manor who had previously had some involvement with Hartlepool HEAT basketball club. Howard Leighton, the England Basketball assessor taking the course asked the 11 of us who were taking the qualification for volunteers to go first. I took the plunge and decided to put myself forward. No time like the present!

My session plan comprised of a 10 minute warm up exercise, followed by a 15 minute drill teaching dribbling skills to emphasise control and then a 10 minute session working on jump stops and pivot turns to help develop balance. It would then be followed by a 10 minute cool down.

All was going well through the dribbling until I started to realise a couple of the pupils were losing interest. I had got to take account of the fact I had got a mixed ability group. What to do? I decided to engage those more developed students by using them to demonstrate the activities. The plan worked. They were engaged again. The jump stop and pivot exercise went well and the session was wound up.

Then the moment of truth. Howard called me over and gave me his assessment. Communications skills good, session content good, pupils understood that they were learning the basics of control and balance, and I had adapted well to a mixed ability group. All I needed to do now was complete an analysis of where I would take a future session to build upon what I had done. That would be developing passing to add to the control element already delivered with the drill on dribbling. To my great relief I had passed. However, as Howard pointed out, if I want to progress to a level 2, I had better remember my whistle in future!

So I now have my level 1 with the Foundation. Now for that placement and volunteering!