Mini Tossing Golf

This past week was the end of my tossing unit with my 5th, 4th, and 3rd grades. I wanted to evaluate their tossing skills with a fun application game at the end of the unit. I combined the underhand toss with the game of golf inside my gymnasium. A couple days this past week we had beautiful weather, so I was able to take my classes outside and create an even larger tossing golf course.



I had the students choose their own partners, which worked well, because they paired up with their classmates who had similar skill levels in the toss. This created a welcoming learning environment, and the students were very excited to start the game. As the students walked in, I had the directions set up on my white board that I wheel around my gym. They found a partner and sat on the middle line which was in the middle of the course. I then gave them a tour of the course and where the holes were and in what order they were going to play them in. I wrote the number of the hole and an arrow giving the direction it was in so it was easy to follow.



You can find this picture at: www.the-office.com/Bedtime-Story/mousenap.htm

Once the students understood how to play the game, I passed out a score card. This is where I incorporated math into my lesson. The students kept track of their scores and counted how many tosses it took them to make it inside the hula hoop. At the end of the game, after every group played all 9 holes, I had them tally up their individual scores, then their team scores.



I used the score cards as an assessment tool. The student who had the lowest score, had the highest proficiency in the underhand toss. I also used my observational techniques to assess the students as well. All of my students in all three grades really enjoyed this game. They were on their own and participated well with each other.



I taught toward the affective domain by explaining that the game of golf is a game of respect. Each group had to wait until the group ahead of them finished the hole. I also explained how important it was to not distract the other groups when they were tossing so they could completely focus on the attempt.



Mini Tossing Golf was a big hit! I am definitely going to use it next year!