The Growth of Wheelchair Rugby
Timing: 2-3 x 45 minute blocks
CROSS-CURRICULAR: Mathematics, Social Studies
LEARNING OUTCOMES: Sample Grade 5
OVERVIEW: This lesson includes the interpretation of data regarding participating countries at international level games and demonstrates a means of showing the incredible growth of wheelchair rugby as a world-class sport.
CURRICULUM SKILLS / KNOWLEDGE / VALUES:
Students will:
- read and interpret the information provided regarding the growth of Wheelchair Rugby from the 1990’s to the present
- learn different means of graphic representation to illustrate the trends
- be able to read and interpret student-generated graphs
TEACHING MATERIALS:
- computer and printer access
- pencils, pencil crayons, graph paper
- websites for wheelchair rugby summary of countries participating per World Championships and Paralympic Games, the medal standings per games, historical results database, and rankings:
- Review Duncan Campbell’s Story for timeline.
Teaching Activities
- In pairs or small groups, have the students read and interpret the information provided regarding the history of the sport, the numbers of countries participating, their standing in world competitions such as the World Championships and the Paralympics, and the overall growth of wheelchair rugby as a world-recognized sport. Discuss their findings and discuss possible ways of representing their findings graphically (e.g. line or bar graphs).
- Examine the possible ways of representing information graphically (e.g. line graphs, bar graphs, pictographs, charts, percentage increase/decrease etc.). Engage the students in completing the following:
- a graph showing the change over time of the number of countries participating at the world level.
- a graph showing the change over time of the number of emerging teams.
- a graph showing the change over time in the wheelchair rugby world standings.