Author Topic: Teaching Parkour at School  (Read 1407 times)

Offline Joey Paris

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Teaching Parkour at School
« on: August 31, 2009, 02:26:46 PM »
Alright, so after a long time trying to convince my school's JROTC instructors to start including Parkour in their physical training curriculum I have made some progress in getting the program approved. However, in order for us to start doing Parkour as part of the class I was told I need to come up with some sort of lesson plan that we would follow throughout the year. So I need you guys to help me come up with a lesson plan that would allow Parkour to be taught at my school. The general pattern I feel it should follow is starting out with the history of Parkour and key people related to the sport (such as David Belle and Sebastien Foucan) and then moving on to the Martial Art/Mental side of Parkour and then through the basics (most likely starting with a roll) to far more advanced moves. How do you guys think I should go about the lesson plan? Any help is appreciated. I would love to be able to bring Parkour and Free Running to more people.

Also what movies/documentaries would you recommend to watch? I think I'm going to start with Jump London unless you guys have a better idea.

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #1 on: August 31, 2009, 02:31:24 PM »

Offline Corndogg

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #2 on: August 31, 2009, 02:56:14 PM »
Here's the agenda we go by for our monthly SFPK Beginner's Classes - http://www.sfparkour.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2248 .  Everyone is free to use.  The structure has been working out really well for us.  Hopefully this will give you a baseline to start from, then you'd have to extrapolate it out for a year long class plan.  I'd recommend that the plan include conditioning, lots of drills, progression, and emphasis on flow, not individual movements.  Really drill the basics then modify from there.  Definitely QM stuff too.  There's lots of games out there (threads on them here and at SFPK) that can be incorporated as well.  Would love to see the lesson plan when its done!  And everyone elses for that matter  ;D
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Offline Joey Paris

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #3 on: August 31, 2009, 03:33:50 PM »
Thanks for the help guys I'll check both of those sites out. Right now were doing a lot of conditioning and that's going to most likely what were replacing. Well not replacing just adding to it.

Offline kevin27

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #4 on: August 31, 2009, 04:41:32 PM »
thats awesome! for me i just train on my own time because my school is way to close minded along with my community
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Offline Andrew Wilson

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #5 on: August 31, 2009, 04:59:46 PM »
You want a good class structure? I have one. I would say start with a warm up generally. Stretching of the back, arms, and legs. Do some squats, some push ups, rollercoasters, etc. While people are doing that, tell them about history, the founders, etc. for the first few days. Then, yeah, work on rolls and such. If people laugh at you during any point, have them demonstrate to the best of their abilities. Do not mock them if they can't do it, but tell them what they could do better. Have the who class drill, then progress. After your class is done, the cooldown works really well. I can see SFPK uses it, and RVPK uses it as well. All in all, it should be pretty structured.

Also, for a documentary, Point B. Best one I've seen.
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Offline Joey Paris

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #6 on: August 31, 2009, 05:00:01 PM »
Hey, my school was close minded for the longest time. It took me over a year to convince them, and a heck of a lot of demonstration lol, but eventually I did it. Well sort of, if they like the curriculum we put together.

Offline Joey Paris

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #7 on: August 31, 2009, 05:03:56 PM »
Sorry if this is a double post, I'm not sure how to merge two comments together I'm new to the forums section.

If people laugh at you during any point, have them demonstrate to the best of their abilities. Do not mock them if they can't do it, but tell them what they could do better.

Also, for a documentary, Point B. Best one I've seen.
Haha, that's an incredible idea. People try laughing at me all the time... for no apparent reason. I'm not sure what they find about Parkour funny but I like that idea.

Point B? I'll have to look into that one I haven't even heard of it yet.

Also, does anyone have any good sources for a detailed history?

Offline Grayson

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #8 on: August 31, 2009, 06:10:05 PM »
I eat a lot of food.

Offline Joey Paris

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #9 on: August 31, 2009, 06:59:11 PM »
This is a must show to school boards http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4001097277208720031

I am 100% showing that to my teachers tomorrow. There's no way that won't convince them to go through with this.

Offline My Name

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #10 on: September 01, 2009, 04:45:37 PM »
This is a must show to school boards http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4001097277208720031

I am 100% showing that to my teachers tomorrow. There's no way that won't convince them to go through with this.
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i agree that was the perfect documentry for authority figures and it did a pretty good job of explaining the discipline too

Offline Alex frogger Brown

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Re: Teaching Parkour at School
« Reply #11 on: September 03, 2009, 07:10:21 PM »
another good thing to show them is a study that was done a while back ago: they introced Parkour into inter-city P.E. programs and the juvinile crime went down smethin like 12% i think(not sure on the exact number). its some where on APK,ill trey and find it for u

PS  howd u convince the school?
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