Eighth graders at Spencerport’s Cosgrove Middle School recently spent a good part of Physical Education class sitting down, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t getting a good workout or that they weren’t learning. They’ve been taking part in a unique and innovative mini-unit on wheelchair basketball.
Phys. Ed. teachers Eileen Buck and Ashley Somers, along with the support of Principal Ned Dale, rented ten wheelchairs, allowing for students to have the experience of playing modified basketball while gaining an understanding of what it is like to move around and play with physical limitations and challenges.
“Monroe Wheelchair helped us out,” Dale says. “They offered the wheelchairs at a reduced cost to help support the unit.”
The wheelchair unit was held in the days before Thanksgiving break. Opportunities to play and take part in the experience were also provided after school for students who were not part of the class.
“We couldn’t have predicted the overwhelming response,” Dale says.
During a typical class, the students rotate while playing five-on-five games. Half the class plays regular basketball, while the other half plays modified wheelchair basketball.
Eileen Buck was inspired with the idea to do the mini-unit, “It was a random thought,” she says, “I wondered what would it be like.”
Eighth grader Jack Zyra is one of her students. He uses a wheelchair and is an inspiration to all and gives every task 110 percent.
Buck says she wondered how the mini-unit would work and how students would respond to something as unique as this was.
“Jack was excited to help,” she says, “and the kids wanted to do it. Ned (Dale) didn’t flinch.”
“Jack has taught me so much about what he needs here at Cosgrove,” Dale adds. “It was the least I could do (to help with setting up the unit) and to help teach other kids something about what it is like for him.”
Jack’s enthusiasm is contagious. He calls the mini-unit “awesome” and “special,” and explains that it is important for his fellow students to understand the challenges that he faces everyday.
Jack has been the go-to person for students working to get a grasp on maneuvering the wheelchairs.
“They go by me and see what I’m doing,” he explains.
Jack is all over the floor during games: dribbling, wheeling down the court, taking shots, and effortlessly retrieving the ball when it gets away from other students.
Buck says Jack routinely takes physical education class with no modifications – playing goalie for soccer on his knees, for example.
“He wants to be a part of what everyone else does,” she says.
Jack says it can be easy for him to feel isolated and alone in his wheelchair, but it has been “special (to see this peers) doing something different,” which allowed both him and his classmates to connect in a way in which they had never before been able.
Dale and Buck say the unit is helping students to gain an appreciation for Jack and how others go through life differently,” and reinforces the message to Jack’s classmates about the importance of being a team, of being a friend and of supporting others.
“It teaches them tolerance, and gives them another perspective,” Dale says. “It helps them appreciate what they might take for granted.”
Dale notes that after the first class, students said their arms were very tired, but “Jack doesn’t complain” about such things, he says.
Students were also required to complete such tasks as taking attendance sheets to the main office in the wheelchair – a job which helped them to see how difficult it can be just getting through doors without scraping your knuckles while in a wheelchair.
After a couple of classes, Buck told her students they were much improved and suggested they might try a different sport in the chairs if time allowed.
Buck says the district hopes to carry the program to the high school level next year as Jack will be in ninth grade. “We will still do it at Cosgrove,” she notes, regardless of the fact Jack will have moved on to another school.
Photos by Kristina Gabalski
12/1/13
