Smarter PE planning – How resources can help you plan dynamic and engaging physical education lessons
You wouldn’t be reading this blog if you didn’t want to deliver a high quality, progressive and enriched PE curriculum at your school. The benefits of PE in primary schools are overwhelming, and support all children in developing a range of physical and cognitive skills.
PE lessons help to encourage physical fitness and are the gateway into many sports. PE lessons introduce children to what may well become life-long hobbies, creating not only an enjoyable physical outlet, but a healthier future.
But of course, the dreaded planning element can be the thorn in every primary school teacher’s side. You don’t want to spend hours each week coming up with new warm ups and cool downs or ideas for teaching new skills, you want to be out there teaching inspiring lessons!
The good news is, there’s a wealth of quality PE resources out there that help remove the stress of planning and make teaching PE a breeze. From downloadable tools, to easy-to-follow videos, it’s never been easier to ensure PE at your school is well-rounded, relevant and fun.
Why is planning important in PE?
Working from clear lesson plans is vital, to ensure lessons meet the needs of the year group being taught and to allow consideration for a diverse range of activities. It also means you have structured lessons from which you can clearly demonstrate the intent, implementation and impact, as detailed by Ofsted as part of its Education Inspection Framework.
Let’s take a deep dive into why PE lesson plans are so important.
Meeting National Curriculum requirements
Being aware of the curriculum and what it states makes a good basis for the physical education at your school.
A reminder that the curriculum aims to ensure that all pupils:
- Develop competence to excel in a broad range of physical activities
- Are physically active for sustained periods of time
- Engage in competitive sports and activities
- Lead healthy, active lives.
Progression and assessment
Planning is vital to build an element of progression into your PE lessons. Effective lesson plans can make sure that skills taught early on in a term can be revisited and built upon throughout the term. This helps pupils to recognise their improvements and feel a sense of achievement.
Assessment is a key part of the learning journey and not just an end goal by which to measure success or failure. It helps to give teachers a clear idea as to whether pupils are learning the key skills being taught and provides valuable insights into what should be covered in future lessons.
Meeting the needs of your pupils
As their teacher, you know your pupils and their abilities, and can devise lesson plans that meet the needs of everyone in your class – no matter what their strengths and weaknesses.
Lesson plans that have adaptations for those who aren’t as strong physically, who have special educational needs or who just lack physical confidence, ensures that each and every pupil is motivated and engaged, and ultimately feels successful.
What makes a good PE lesson plan?
Physical education lesson plans should all contain a number of components to make sure they are not only easy to follow for teachers, but provide the best possible learning experience for children.
Clear objectives
Making sure the plan has a clear learning intent is key. What should the children have learnt by the end of the lesson? Does the lesson align with the curriculum?
Engaging activities
Plan activities and games that are challenging enough to engage pupils without making them overcomplicated. Ensure you deliver clear instructions that are easy-to-follow, use demonstrations and keep the explaining bit to a minimum!
Cross curricular links
As their teacher, you know what the children are learning about in other subjects – so can any themes be incorporated into their PE lessons? Perhaps they are learning about structures in design and technology or they’ve been to a zoo on a school trip recently; these sorts of things can be built into PE to help to further spark children’s imagination.
Focus on fun
Whether you’re teaching Key Stage 1 or 2, the focus should be on fun and progression of skills. This helps children who don’t perceive themselves as ‘sporty’ to enjoy experiencing a variety of elements and find activities they can connect with and feel confident in.
Resources
Be clear on the equipment and resources needed for each lesson, making sure they are appropriate for the age and skill of the class.
Effective time keeping
Efficient timing can make a huge difference to maximising active time. Be realistic with what you want to teach, and make sure you allow time for warm ups, transitions between exercises and stretches at the end of the lesson.
Making the most out of PE planning resources
Primary PE planning can be given an injection of energy by the effective use of the resources out there. Here at Premier Education, we’ve gone one step further than simply providing online planning tools with the launch of our new online platform, Pepé.
Developed to be your PE partner, Pepé brings you so much more than just schemes of work and lesson plans. Its functionality allows you to gain real insights into PESSPA across the whole school; you can measure progress and identify gaps, monitor and analyse extracurricular activity and ultimately maximise your Sport Premium funding.
With Pepé, all the hard work is done for you, and you’ll no longer be in the dark wondering whether PESSPA at your school is well-rounded, effective and meeting the pupils’ needs.
And, if you join the waitlist for Pepé before 17th May, you could be one of 500 schools to get exclusive, FREE access to all of Pepé’s features, for one academic year.
Find out more about Pepé and its benefits, or arrange a demo, here.
