Testing of the games “Higher” and “Ten to win” as a part of the project “Sport tolerance”, was organized in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina on 1st of March. Testing process was planned and implemented as planned:
- The games was supposed to show the impact of different starting positions, and unfair advantages, and how the kids react to them.
- Another impact of the games is to show that with teamwork any obstacle can be tackled and beaten
The event itself was organized in the sports hall Basketball Club “Lions” Tuzla, during their practice There were 15 players between 5 and 14 years of age together with 2 coaches who took active participation throughout the whole event.
Game “Higher”
- We started the 1st round of this game by explaining all of the very simple rules of the game that had to be followed. The main goal of the activity is to show the impact of disadvantage and different starting positions within sports. The participants were devided in two groups. Each group needed to select a captain. The captains than speak to the trainer, who explains the game. Both groups need to build castles using their bodies. The castle needs to be as high as possible. One group has an unfair advantage, and can use whatever they can find, while the other group must use only their bodies. Each group has 10 minutes to plan how they are going to approach the game. It is important to note that safety is of the utmost priority and that the participants shan’t do anything that can potentially hurt them. After the 10 minutes period, the participants have 3 minutes to create their towers. After the trainers decide the “winners”, we switch the roles of the teams. Both teams need to be in both positions. The final round of the game consists of both teams being in the same positions, ai. not being able to use anything but their bodies. With both groups finishing their towers, the trainer started a discussion about how the participants have felt during the game. Most participants commented that they felt unfairly treated when they were in the disadvantaged group. They felt as if their group was less valuable in regard to the other. When being in the other group all of the participants stated that they knew it was unfair but they still went with it, as they felt their group had an advantage. They stated that the way to beat adversity like that is to work as a team, and to try to work harder than the other team. The trainer explained that the goal of this activity was to teach them to combat radicalization in sports. Tolerance is something you teach from a young age and for the participants it is important to recognize this and work towards the goal. Main conclusion of our discussion was that the players realized how it’s like to be in a disadvantaged position and what type of challenges these kids face in their everyday life.
Game “Ten to win”
We started this game similar to the first on, and that is by explaining the rules. In this game the participants are devided in two teams ( offense and defense). The offensive team has the task of connecting 10 passes. If the ball falls or a defender intercepts the ball or they manage to score, the offensive team, becomes the defensive side. The team that is defending has the task of stopping the attacking team in connecting passes, but they can not take the ball out of a players hand, rather only intercept it. The team in attack gets one point when they manager to connect 10 passes.The goal is to reach 3 points. Both teams are playing on the same court and they take their positions as they wish, as long as they are not to close to each other. The game is supposed to be dynamic to the coach encourages the players to run and move around. After one team manages to scores 3 points the groups get new instructions. Coach told the group that half of the offensive players can now use only one arm to pass and catch. This is supposed to show the struggles that people with disabilities face in their everyday life, and sports as well. After the round is completed, the participants sat down with the coach and discussed the issues that they faced in this second round. The coach asked the participants about how they think people with dissabilities are able to participate within sporting events and games, and wheater they would be able to patient enough to be teammates with someone like that. Before the beginning of the next round, the coach has told two members of each team, to make mistakes intentionaly. In this round it was important that the coach realizes how each member of the team deals with the team dynamic and with the person making those mistakes. This round uses the premise of someone just not being that good at sports. The coach needs to teach the players about how to embrace and motivate their piers and not bring them down. This can also apply to children with special needs, as they as well will most often make mistakes, but it is up to the rest of the team to stay by their side motivate them and pick them up.
- To conclude these two activities have proven to fulfill the purpose and have proven to be extremely fun and entertaining for the participants. There is a multitude of variations that could be applied on these activities to further develop the context and target groups.
Marko Divković, coach
European initiative for promotion of tolerance and solidarity through sport 