Journal #2

The “McElway Basketball Story” is a video that chronicles the events surrounding Jason, a high school age boy with autism. Jason had been his high school basketball teams water boy for all of his high school career. One game day coach decided to suit Jason up and let him have the experience of being in a jersey with the team, he did not promise court time though. But, in the the last four minutes of the game coach pointed to Jason and sent him out to play. His rotation didn’t start well, but he ended up scoring six, three point shots! This video really warmed my heart. It shows that when you give people a chance, they will often rise to the occasion. Despite the fact that Jason may not be considered to be like the rest of the basketball team due to his autism, he was just as capable a basketball player as the rest of the team. This shows that inclusion and equality is a good thing and can have very good results. This video not only portrays the physical outcome of inclusion, them winning the basketball game and Jason scoring so many baskets, but also the physiological result, Jason states that he has never felt so special in his life. Inclusion and equality has the power to do many great things.

  by  BLW Photography 

This video really makes you think about what makes an athlete. As by dictionary.com an athlete is described as someone who is a, “person trained to compete in sports or exercises involving physical strength, speed, or endurance”. Does this mean an athlete can not just be someone with a passion for sport, who may not be the best, but enjoys it? I believe that this video shows the merging of these two ideas. Jason was not thought to be the most talented basketball player, but he had dedication and passion. When he hit the court he surprised everyone with his apptitude for the sport. This is who an athlete should be, someone who has an undying passion for the game with some skill, a merging of these two principles.

by RMTip21

This idea can be applied to individuals development through sport. There is a quote of Vince Lombardi’s that goes, “If you can’t accept losing, you can’t win.” I think this summarizes well the personal growth that can occur in sport. Losing is a powerful thing, you learn so much from it. It teaches you many lessons, one of which is getting up again. That is how you win, by learning how to be a graceful loser, and getting up again everytime, learning from your mistakes. This is a hard lesson for many people to grasp, but once it is it’s an invaluable trait. This illustrates how tuly winning isn’t the ultimate goal in sport. Winning sure is sweet, but losing is an amazing learning oppurtunity. Sport in general is an amazing learning oppuryunity. That is believe, learning and personal growth, is the ultimate goal of sport.

  by  CassAnaya 

Journal #1

A trend that seems to be coming more and more common is for children, often of prepubescent age, to specialize in one sport, dedicating all their time to it. This is opposed to being involved in many sports, at not as serious of a caliber. In the article “Intensive Training and Sports Specialization in Young Athletes” it explores the idea that specializing in a sport at such a young age may actually present health risks.

Honestly my initial reaction to the article was confusion, they used a lot of big words and terms I didn’t understand, but after contemplating the article and understanding the idea it was trying to present I had to agree with what the article was saying. While it even states in the article that there isn’t an abundance of solid proof to it having negative effects on children, there is enough to conclude that it can be harmful for them. I agree with this because of not only the physical effects, such as the possibility of getting repetitive strain injuries from only developing a certain set of muscles and using certain ones, but also I believe it’s negative because as a child being involved in many different sports is a great way to meet many other children with the same interests as you. Therefore, I believe that being involved in many different sports is beneficial to children’s social growth.

This leads to the question of why do children specialize at such a young age then? I believe that this occurrence happens because of parent involvement. At the young age that children are specializing parents still play a huge influence over their kids. I believe the influence of parents is the cause to early specialization. This drive for parents to push their kids into this path comes a couple different places I believe. They either have dreams of their child making it big, whether that’s the NHL or the Olympics or any other respective path, or the parent has a passion for a sport so they believe that their child should be only involved in it. In a sense the parent is living vicariously through their child.

I believe that this mentality of parents has evolved from present society. There is so much emphasis on being good at sports leading you to being successful, in life in every media source that you look at, that I believe this is becoming a Western worldview. There is so much emphasis on not just participating in sport for fun, but to be successful and win. This is another cause for youth sport specialization. If children specialize young they have a better chance of becoming amazing at their chosen field and one day going pro, the ultimate success in sport in this new Western worldview.

As a child I didn’t specialize in just one sport, quite the opposite actually, I played just about every sport imaginable. I believe this has had a very positive influence over my development. It has allowed me to make numerous lasting friendships with people of common interest and it allowed me to really figure out which sport I’m passionate about. So, when I hit high school age and decided to specialize, I was completely happy and dedicated to my sport, which happens to be throwing within track and field. Playing a number of sports as a youth has lead me to be a happier athlete.

  by  bradleypjohnson 

Introduction to Exercise Science

I chose to take exercise science because I want to become a physiotherapist after high school.  I am hoping that from this class I will get an idea if physiotherapy is really for me. Through facets such as learning about the body, presentations from physiotherapists and, by learning more about what physiotherapy would encompass I think I will be able to get a good idea if it’s for me or not . Another reason I chose to take this class is because I am generally interested in what the class has to offer. I am particularly interested in the unit “Human Performance”, and learning about all the factors that go, particularly, into an athlete’s performance. I am hoping to learn things that I can apply to my own life from this class.