To think allowing children to pick teams has no place in a modern school

[ReallyTired]

Ie. the set up when sadistic games teacher picks two favourites as team captains and then the team captains pick children for their team. The last three are the fat kid, the kid with smelly breath and the kid with hearing aids.

Surely its possible to have a hockey lesson in a primary school with without the painful experience of being last to be picked. I feel that a teacher could have games groups just like they have groups for maths and english. There could be two top groups, two middle groups and two bottom groups. Each group of children would be challenged competition wise and there would be no popularity contest.

My son's teacher has been using this approach and I have made a formal complaint to the head teacher. My son was the second last to be picked as he is very uncoorindated. (Ds has had child phyio in the past) He felt sorry for the kid with bad breathe that no one wanted on their team.

My son's school will not give out any prizes on sports days to the winners for fear of hurting the feelings of children who don't get prize. It is not logical that they don't chose to spare the feelings of the rejectee child who is put off sport for life.

Yeah, in theory.

I went to school in the 00's... it's now 2012.

In practise, IME.

Maybe I just teach in an unusual school...

My eldest has started in Y7 and her games and PE sessions are "set" ... they had "tests" on stamina/speed/ball accuracy and balance in the first 2 sessions and have been put into 4 sets -

teams get picked by teacher with the line up, number one to six - sometimes first six make a team, sometimes all the ones, sometimes 1s and 3s etc... so teacher can mix it up a bit depending how it goes. (and the kids can't pre-empt things)

but - when they get together and play netball/basketball or a football kick around at lunchtime they pick their own teams, so it happens anyhow...

I think those saying things haven't changed are misguided. As Evil said there is much more scrutiny now and students are also much more willing to challenge behaviour from teachers that they see as unfair. I am not saying that all PE teachers are lovely or that there is no bullying etc but the possibilities for bullying are greatly reduced now. For example there is no showering in the vast majority of schools.

Tell me about, dd comes home smelling rather high on PE days! I know things have changed a lot, in pretty much every way. Which is why I'm a bit surprised that team picking still happens at all.

Actually wrt showering you are right - ds has showers at his school but they are allowed to wear trunks/costumes or not have them. In fact the PE teacher isn't in the changing room at all which is a good thing imo! So maybe things have changed and I'm just a bitter old cow

We never showered. It's just humiliating making people undress in front of strangers. For me just getting changed in front of everyone was bad enough, I would spend ages the night and morning before trying to de-fuzz my legs and they were never perfect enough.

And they wonder why kids don't take up sport .

Eviltwins - in that case it is simply a lack of compassion and understanding of children. Whatever it is, there is NEVER any need to embarrass a child in this way. Once, twice - whatever - once is too much.

Would you condone a school quiz with a lot of mixed ability children; the clever ones picking the other clever ones until the only ones left were the ones everyone though were stupid. I am sure this would never be accepted.

I don't really think choosing teams for drama falls into the same category to be honest.

By the way, my comprehension is fine, thanks.

YANBU and I'm shocked it still happens

DD has just started y7 at a sports specialist college, they have been setted immediately for PE. She's gutted because she's in a lower set, yet she's really good at cross country - the problem is she has dyspraxia, so ball skills etc are really not good - she is worried she will not be able to keep getting better at her running and held back - but the PE teacher so far has been lovely and really encouraging, we met him at a cc league race the other day and he was brilliant to her, so things seem fine, we will see.

I was a picked laster too - glasses and crappy lungs which meant I got short of breath quickly - no chance. Have awful memories. Worst was, and I cannot quite believe this now but remember it clearly, I told my PE teacher I had my period. She made me show her my soiled sanitary towel to prove it at the time I just did it, but how disgusting is that? i'd be livid if that was dd now.

I went to several schools but I only remember two PE teachers. One was an absolute mountain of a woman. The other was some kind of steroid popping she-ra with an unbelievable tan.

Both practised 'pick your own groups' and I was always in the bottom few.

If either teacher had taken the time to teach me how to play basketball, netball, rounders or whatever then perhaps I'd have been better at the sport and then maybe I wouldn't have been chosen last or near to last all the time.

They just blew a whistle and you were expected to know what to do.

Oh FFS. Will people pleeeease stop using their experience of PE in the bloody 70s and 80s as evidence of teaching methods NOW

Oh FFS. Will people pleeeease stop using their experience of PE in the bloody 70s and 80s as evidence of teaching methods NOW
ok hows this, my kids school(s) did this two years ago, repeat two years ago, and both kids tell me now that they found it an exercise in popularity, and that the teachers were well aware of that. OK? recent enough for you?

My PE teacher would always suss out who normally got picked last and make those kids be the captains! Then all the non-sporty kids got picked first, and then the nice kids, then the bullies. It worked a treat to see the bully kids selling themselves to their victims so they could avoid being last picked.
And it didn't seem to generate a lot of repercussions, either.

In my first year of high school at eleven years old the drama teacher asked me to speak "sexily" to him in front of the entire class. I wasnt too sure what sexy was at that age but went for a slightly breathy voice (id probably seen an old Marilyn Monroe film) and i also did it very quietly because i felt embarrassed. He then told me in front of the entire class that "that was about as sexy as a bag of washing"

I think that picking teams for drama is every bit as vile as picking teams for PE.

Can you imagine it being made patently clear that a child is crap at acting. How wonderful it must be for their stage confidence - NOT!

Children learn best when they are happy. Children who are stressed, sad or angry cannot concentrate

EvilTwins allowing kids to pick teams or groups is shitty teaching. It will only be stamped out if parents take a stand and not put up with it.

Surely you put the best children in the first team, next lot in the second team.

How will they win against other schools if they are all comers?

Actually, I think you'll find that in picking "teams" for drama, they just pick their mates. I try to avoid it because I think it's important that they get used to working in a variety of groups. I do let them pick very occasionally, but then it's a case of "get yourselves into groups" rather than asking captains to choose.
The kids prefer it when I let them choose.

Teams should be random. A school shouldn't be a place where children go and get judged or graded on ability.

th. And to be fair, you can't always blame the children for not wanting that person

But Kim surely part of the reason school is there in the first place is to prepare children and young people for the world of work later on.
Whats going to happen to those children when they go into the world of work? Are they going to say "i dont want to work with so and so because i dont like him.