Wellness & Fitness Challenge!

One of the Wellness & Fitness goals for our Department is "Staff Wellness." This year, we decided to take it to a new level with a Wellness & Fitness Challenge. Staff members formed teams of four and each member committed to a goal for themselves. It could be anything from exercising more to eating healthier. It was their goal and members of their team agreed to support each other. We allowed friendly trash-talking, and it was fun to see the competitiveness that evolved!

In the middle of this friendly competition, we held an Eagles Shootout with teams from grade levels or departments. I watched our physical education teacher having a Shootout with a class of second graders and knew immediately that I wanted to do this with our staff.  We had this activity on a Wednesday when meetings are usually scheduled, and I was pleased to see so many staff members come out to participate, even some who had never shot a basketball in years! The beauty of this Shootout was that anyone could score points for their team, and everyone had so much fun as evidenced by the laughter, the encouragement, and the cheering. In the end, the fifth grade team took first place and the custodial team took second place, but the real winners were all of the staff who participated. As we were all leaving to go back to our rooms, I heard comments like, "That was so much fun!" or "That was the best Wednesday meeting we've had!" or "Let's do it again!"

As we talk about ways to build community within our classrooms, we cannot forget that we need to build community within our staff. Sometimes, in the urgency to "get things done," we forget to schedule "fun" activities that can showcase the talents of our students or our staff.

We already have our next activity planned . . . and we look forward to an even better turnout than we had for our Eagles Shootout!

Just some friendly trash-talking between teams

A photo before the Eagles Shootout
Those who didn't participate came out to cheer. 

Practicing before the competition started

Explaining the rules to the kindergarten team

We asked each team to post in our Google+ community under "Health and Wellness." This is an example of what one group shared.

The FLASH team even had their own shirts!
Fit Ladies Always Stay Healthy :-)

The Suicide Squad took turns preparing a healthy salad on Tuesday, and the team ate together.

The Team HELY (Heather, Ellen, Lora, Yuuko) posted inspiring messages each week.