PE Games Physical Education Resources

Inclusivity and accessibility are high on the agenda at Premier Education, which is why we’re sharing some of our favourite PE lesson plans intended to engage the whole class.

It’s vital that children of all ages and abilities have access to high-quality PE lessons, which promote active learning, develop physical literacy and improve skills development.

Especially as physical education benefits health and personal development.

Whether you’re a passionate PE or schools sports lead or an early career teacher taking the reins of the school’s PE lessons, how can you ensure that classes are as engaging and exciting as possible?

We have 3 lesson plans to help you get started:

1. The Alien Invasion

2. End Ball

3. Dance Travels

Trusted experts

At Premier Education, we work with thousands of teachers and schools across the country to provide much-needed support and direction when it comes to delivering PE lessons which fit the school and National Curriculum.

From PE Planning, curriculum mapping, lesson plans and assessment, our ‘best in class’ network of activity professionals are charged with the primary goal of improving children’s health and wellbeing.

PE lesson plans

The following PE lessons plans have been developed for delivery to primary school audiences (age 4-11, key stage 1 and 2).

Our PE lesson plans have been developed by former heads of PE, PE teaching staff and subject leads so you can have confidence that our resources are perfectly tailored to deliver National Curriculum based PE lessons.

The Alien Invasion

This is an inclusive lesson plan which we developed for Teach Primary.

This plan requires teachers and children to get creative and use their imaginations, transforming the classroom or sports hall to match the ‘space’ theme – a hoop becomes a planet, a travelling ball a laser!

Preparation activity

Pupils have to avoid the alien taggers (recommended ratio 1 alien: 3 pupils). Alien taggers travel around space holding a hoop (or flying saucer) and try to tag other pupils with the hoop. If caught, pupils freeze in a star shape and wait for a different pupil to unfreeze them by running underneath an arm.

Encourage pupils to look in all directions to seek out space, hold arms in a neutral position to support balance and keep knees soft to support dodging the aliens!

Further adaptations:

• To promote inclusion and level the challenge, restrict taggers to walking or hopping
• Introduce safe zones
• Make area larger or reduce the number of taggers

Main activity

Pupils will be working in groups of 4.

To promote inclusion and progress, try mixed groups to encourage peer support.

Pupils will start by standing in a square, working with the person diagonally to them (to support pupils, use matching colour bibs – i.e. green bibs work together and yellow bibs work together).

With a hoop (or planet) in the middle, give one pupil from each colour group a ball to bounce pass diagonally to their teammate The balls are lasers to send to their partner and must bounce in the hoop first.

Ask pupils how they can help each other – both their partner and the other colour group – to avoid contact of the lasers in the hoop in the middle.

Coaching points to support this include eye on the target (planet) when sending and eye on the ball (laser) with hands ready to catch. The timing of the pass is also important to avoid a laser explosion!

Further adaptations:

• Increase the size of the target or ball
• Award points for other good work such as teamwork, helping a classmate or encouragement

Performance activity

Using the same layout as the previous activity, add an extra hoop in the middle – one for each pair to use.

The two hoops represent each pair’s own planet and the other team are aliens from a different planet looking to invade! Ask children to complete a set number of passes (6-10) by bouncing the ball in the other team’s hoop. Once completed, the ball can be placed in the other team’s hoop to show they have successfully invaded!

Naturally when competition occurs, pupils can tend to rush, which compromises consistency. Encourage pupils to focus and take their time!

Further adaptations

• Outnumbered teams for greater success
• To provide a confidence boost to those who need it, have designated planet leaders who show or teach other pupils how they have used their ball.

End Ball

This is an accessible and inclusive PE lesson plan which has been developed with our partners at England Handball.

Involving a good warm up to activate all major muscle groups, this lesson plan focuses on developing fluidity and constant movement.

With an emphasis on passing or receiving the ball, this lesson aims to teach students how to limit running with the ball and, instead, focus on lots of quick passes.

Two teams work to get the ball into each other’s end zone. To maximise active time, the entire class can be ‘in play’ for the entire duration and there are lots of ideas to adapt the lesson to different ages and abilities.

Dance Travels

This fun and engaging physical education lesson plan is set to inspire children to navigate a broad range of movements to music.

Music is a universal language, motivating even the most PE-resistant children. It adds fun and brings joy and energy to the class.

The students not only begin with a cardiovascular warm-up, which is great for fitness, but they have opportunities to adapt their movements to suit different types of music – more graceful movements for slower tempo, up the intensity for fast.

The lesson then culminates in children developing five key modes of ‘travel’ – skip, hop, leap, side-gallop and jog. Fun themes such as superheroes or safari animals are applied, with children performing the different actions to themes on command.

Lesson plans of this kind are brilliant children of varying abilities, with options to increase of decrease the complexity of the activity ideas.

Where can I go for more PE lesson plans?

Want more ideas to help you teach physical education?

Why not reach out to our team of activity professionals? Located across the country, our network of specialists can work with your primary school to enrich PE teaching and provision.

Part of this can be devising lesson plans, supporting with assessment, or curriculum mapping. We also work with partner schools to help with curricular PE delivery and extracurricular provision, if required.

If you’re looking for indoor PE ideas, we have a downloadable PDF packed with even more lesson plans.