This season, we’re excited to be sharing a blog post outlining the curriculum for each week’s practices, from warm-up to cool-down! Each lesson has different topics, goals, and activities specifically designed to optimize the participants’ growth. For a detailed breakdown of each section of the lesson, check out this blog post! This week’s topics are: Our Mountain Mover Team and Recipe of Me! 

 

Our Mountain Mover Team - Lesson #1

Are You Ready? 

It’s the first day of practice! Coaches will use the opening minutes of the practice to connect with each participant, and the team will start learning each other’s names. Teams might toss a bean bag or ball around answering icebreaker questions to increase comfortability in the group.

 

Introduction

The coaches will gather the team into a seated circle and use the next 10-15 minutes to introduce Girls on the Run as a whole, asking a few participants to contribute with what they know about the program. During this time, the coaches will convey key information to the participants, including but not limited to:

• Practice information (start and end time, what to wear, what to bring) 

• The season’s goals (healthy movement, learning about different topics, giving back to the community through the Community Impact Project, completing the 5K) 

• The way we move (for different participants, running can look different – skipping, galloping, walking, etc)

 

Creating Belonging

For a successful season, the team needs to create an agreement to ensure that everyone feels safe and respected at practice! The coaches will create a poster board with five points that the team will agree to. 

1. Listen when others speak. 

2. Be kind to everyone. 

3. Encourage others. 

4. ____________________

5.  

   ____________________

The participants will have the opportunity to brainstorm ideas for the fourth and fifth points that they want to include. Then, everyone will sign the agreement, committing to upholding it for the season. The coaches will revisit this poster throughout the season as a regular reminder of the team’s values. 

Then, each participant will receive an index card to be shared only with the coaches. They can use this index card to communicate something about themselves that they want the coaches to know, like a preferred name, a word to describe themselves, or a fun fact! Later, the coaches can review these cards and check-in with participants as needed. 

 

Getting on Board

The coaches will introduce the lesson’s Big Idea: Our GOTR Team!

During this time, the participants will have the opportunity to come up with their GOTR name — their name with an adjective starting with the same letter before it (ex: Awesome Abby, Silly Samantha, Joyful Jessica). Each teammate will receive a name tag to write her GOTR name on, and the team will go around the circle introducing themselves to help commit each other’s names to memory. 

Then, it’s time for a game! The activity is a slight modification of “Duck, Duck, Goose.” The participant who is “it” will walk around the circle, placing their hand above the person’s head and asking, “Name?” The other will respond by saying her GOTR name for the rest of the group to hear. But, when the person who is “it” says “Move!” instead of “Name?” both participants will run around the circle going opposite directions. When their paths cross, they’ll high-five! When they both arrive back at the open space, the person who was “it” will sit down, the other will become “it,” and the game continues. 

After the game is over, coaches will ask a processing question to help the girls think critically about the activity: Why do you think we took time to make and share our GOTR names?

 

Stretch & Strengthening Exercises

The team will move to the location in which they will complete the rest of the workout and begin warming up their bodies for the active section of practice. The coaches will explain the importance of stretching and performing strengthening exercises to help prepare the participants’ bodies to run the end-of-season 5K. 

The team will perform four Cold Warm-Up Exercises, like forward walking lunges, high knee marches, to

y soldier kicks, and knees-up running, then complete a circuit of exercises like 15 squats, 10 in & out crunches, and 30 seconds of running arms. 

 

Warm-up/Workout 

The theme of the workout is Words of Encouragement. A coach will write “We got this!” on the back of the Team Agreement poster, then give the participants a few minutes to brainstorm other encouraging phrases to write. 

The team will transition to the lap space, marked by four cones, and the coaches will explain that the goal is to make their way around the space in a way that feels comfortable to them (running, walking, skipping, etc). As the girls move around the lap, they will high-five each other and use one of the team’s phrases to encourage each other. 

Then, when a coach yells “Team Meet!” or blows a whistle, the participants will run to the nearest cone. At the cone, they will share a fun fact about themselves with the other participants. 

After about 15-20 minutes of this activity, the coaches will help the participants through cool-down stretching while processing the exercise by asking questions: 

• What is one thing you learned about a teammate?

• How did it feel to encourage your teammates?

Wrap-Up

The team will return to a seated circle, and coaches will pass out the GOTR journals and writing utensils. Then, each participant will have a few minutes to write or draw something in their GOTR Toolbox – a page in the journal – that they learned from the day. Participants will have the opportunity to share what they learned and wrote in their journals. 

Finally, it’s time for the Energy Awards! An Energy Award is a short cheer that celebrates individual and team growth. Coaches will give the team an Energy Award for completing their first practice, then wrap up with a cheer: Girls on the Run is so much fun!

 

Recipe of Me - Lesson #2

Getting on Board

The team will sit in a circle facing each other. Coaches will begin the practice by reviewing every participant’s GOTR name and the Team Agreement drafted at the first practice. Then it's time for the day’s Big Idea: Recipe of Me. Coaches will explain that each participant is made up of many ingredients like Personality, family, gender, race, beliefs, and much more. 

The participants will receive their journals and open to the Recipe of Me page. Then, a coach will call out an activity, like stirring ingredients or putting a dish in the oven, and the participants will perform the movement before writing a new ingredient that makes up who they are in their journal. 

Examples of ingredient prompts: 

• My favorite hobby

• Something unique about me

• One word to describe me

 

Warm-up

After completing the Stretching and Strengthening section, the team will complete an activity called Recipe Tag. Coaches will write “Team Recipe” atop a large sheet of posterboard, then draw 5 of the ingredient card prompts like the ones in the participants’ journals around the sheet. 

Two sets of cones will mark out a start and end line about 40 feet apart, and the Team Recipe poster will be at the end line. Each participant will be given an ingredient like flour sugar, and when their ingredient is called, they will move quickly to the poster at the end line. One coach will stand in the middle, Trying to tag participants as they run past. if a participant is tagged, they will stop and do five squats or five jumping jacks before continuing. 

Then, once they reach the poster, they will share one ingredient from their own personal recipe, and a coach will write down the answer on the poster. After completing this, they will return to the start line. The activity continues until the poster is complete with each participant’s ingredients to constitute the team recipe.

After the activity is complete, coaches will lead the team through processing by asking questions like the following:

•  Did we all write the same ingredients on our recipe?

•  Do you think it's a good thing to have a team of people with all these differences? Why or why not?

Coaches will guide the discussion questions to emphasize the importance of diversity and uniqueness on the team. 

 

Workout: Sharing What Makes Me Special! 

For the day’s workout, the participants will complete laps with a partner. At the start line of each lap, coaches will write down this statement: “My GOTR Name is… and something special about me is…” 

As the participants complete their laps with a partner, they will consider something special about themselves and share it with their partner along with their GOTR name. At the beginning of each lap, they will switch partners to continue getting to know other teammates.

To process the workout, coaches will ask participants these questions while completing cool-down stretching: 

• Why is it important to know our special ingredients? 

• What did you learn about your teammates today? 

 

Wrap-up 

Seated in a circle, the coaches will hand out journals again to each participant and instruct them to open up to the GOTR Toolbox page. The participants will take a few minutes to write or draw something that they love about themselves and will have the opportunity to share what they wrote down with the team. 

Then, the coaches will explain the idea of a GOTR Goal, which helps the participants take what they learned in practice and apply it at school, at home, and anywhere else they go. They will share the GOTR Goal to complete before the next practice:

• Share your recipe with someone outside of GOTR. 

Then, the coaches and participants will give Energy Awards to each other and close the practice with a GOTR cheer!

- Abby Chalmers, Girls on the Run Minnesota Program Intern