{"id":16551,"date":"2017-02-16T14:11:41","date_gmt":"2017-02-16T19:11:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=16551"},"modified":"2017-02-16T14:11:41","modified_gmt":"2017-02-16T19:11:41","slug":"rick-hansen-school-gets-moving-for-activate-auroras-play-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/rick-hansen-school-gets-moving-for-activate-auroras-play-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Rick Hansen School gets moving for Activate Aurora\u2019s Play Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jake Courtepatte<\/strong><\/p>\n

Though Ontario winters may be known as stale and inactive, the Aurora Sports Dome was hopping last Monday with kids getting active, and more importantly, involved.
\nOver 300 students and teachers from Rick Hansen Public School took part in Activate Aurora\u2019s PLAY Day, designed to get kids active and improve physical literacy in today\u2019s youth.
\nWith parents invited to watch and participate, kids had the opportunity to hop, skip, and jump through stations set up throughout the dome, in a unique chance to learn outside of the classroom.
\nRick Hansen Public School is the first Activate Aurora \u2013 designated school to deliver consistent physical literacy programming through its before and after school programs, instructor training, and PLAY Days.
\n\u201cThey\u2019re fully engaged,\u201d said Laurie Mueller, program manager for Sport Aurora, the parent organization of Activate Aurora. \u201cWe call them physically-literate activities. Running, jumping, balance, those kinds of things\u2026those are the fundamentals of physical literacy.\u201d
\nThe initiative is a collaborative effort amongst the Town of Aurora, York Region District School Board and Activate Aurora. Activities are designed to engage students and teachers in skill-based play for children under the age of ten and to help deliver\/explore interesting play options that can be used in and out of the classroom.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s just play, but they\u2019re learning,\u201d said Mueller. \u201cIt\u2019s the fundamentals of movement. If they can master a proper throw, for example, or how to get up, it builds confidence. By the time they go and say \u2018mom, I want to skate,\u2019 they\u2019ve got the fundamentals and the confidence to do so.\u201d
\nStudents\u2019 current physical literacy skills were evaluated by teachers and Sport Aurora\u2019s trained staff, and will be re-evaluated during a June PLAY Day to have their improvement assessed.
\nTeachers and staff leaders at Rick Hansen are in the process of training to run the PLAY Day on their own, involving the entire elementary school.
\n\u201cWhat Activate Aurora has done is train leaders, which Rick Hansen has provided,\u201d said Mueller. \u201cThese volunteers are trained in physical literacy. What we\u2019re hoping is these leaders get a really good understanding of the importance of physical literacy, and allow them to run their own PLAY Days when they want to in the future.\u201d
\nPLAY Days are one of many activities designed to help children build competence and confidence in movement delivered through the Activate Aurora initiative to make Aurora \u201cCanada\u2019s Most Active Community.\u201d
\nActivate Aurora is an Ontario Trillium Foundation-funded project of Sport Aurora supported by the Mayor\u2019s Task Force on Physical Literacy. Additional funding for PLAY Days is provided through the Healthy Kids Community Challenge partnership.
\nMore information on the program, and how to get your school involved, can be found at www.activateaurora.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Though Ontario winters may be known as stale and inactive, the Aurora Sports Dome was hopping last Monday with kids getting active, and more importantly, involved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-sports","category-sports"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16551"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16551\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}