My Favourite Athlete

While English can be a fairly rigid subject in terms of what we can teach to our older students, there's always been a lot of wiggle-room for the younger years. Alongside the more 'traditional' topics, our school has some excellent schemes of work designed around subjects like Greek Mythology, Poetry Through Time, and Mystery Stories - all of which engage and excite the students while introducing them to whole new worlds of language and literature.

One thing that never manages to work its way in, however, is sport. Sure, the occasional Language Paper might have a couple of sources about surfing or skiing, but its extremely rare to find an English lesson centred around sport, despite the fact that sports journalism must be one of the most widely-read sources of information in the country today. How many people (and I include myself in this) turn immediately to the back pages of any paper they happen to pick up? I often find, in fact, that relating English to sport is one of the few ways to engage a large chunk of students that would otherwise be entirely uninterested in a lesson on comparing writers' perspectives, or selecting and synthesising information. With that in mind, I'm determined to create a few lessons at least that allow students to combine their love of sport with the key English skills they will need in the future.

My Favourite Athlete - Lesson

 Image result for eirik bakkeGrowing up, I had three favourite athletes: Nigel Martyn, goalkeeper for Leeds United and perennial back-up to David Seaman for England; Michael Jordan, the greatest basketball player of all time and honorary Looney Tune (if you haven't watched Space Jam with your kids yet, what are you even doing with this time at home?); and, most important of all, Eirik Bakke, Leeds United's Norwegian midfield stalwart. I was uninterested in your David Beckhams, Ronaldos, and Francesco Tottis. I would have taken Bakke over any of them.

KS3

 Image result for lionel messi fact fileYour challenge is to create a player-profile of your favourite athlete (or sports team, if you'd prefer). I want to see a detailed poster/leaflet which tells me everything I need to know about them. This could include:

  • Date of birth & place of birth
  • Clubs they've played for
  • Where they trained as a youngster
  • How they came to play/compete in their sport
  • What they have achieved
  • A short explanation of why they are your favourite athlete
  • Images/illustrations of them
But you can add as much detail as you like. Have a look at the example on the right for a general idea, but I want to see a lot more detail!

KS4

Your job is to create an informative article about your chosen athlete. You need to find the same information, but then use this to create a detailed biography, putting the facts you have researched into your own words, making an effort to link your paragraphs together to create a chronological history of their life and career.

Have a look at this article for an idea of how to organise your research:

Note - This does *not* have to be about a footballer. If your favourite athlete plays American Football, Golf, Cricket, or even Kabaddi (look it up), this exercise is for you.

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