St Brigid’s Presentation Secondary School in Killarney held a Take on the Teacher Challenge to test the fitness levels of both students and the teachers. Here, Transition Year student, Niamh Coffey, reflects on a very successful event – and she maintains the students were the winners!
THE Teachers v Students competition in the school gym was organised by the Transition Year students and every class had a representative competing in the events.
Over the previous weeks, in each PE class, students had been tested in various disciplines like wall sits, bench jumps, walking the plank and skipping. Whoever got the highest marks represented their class on the day. I had the longest plank time in my class so I was doing that on the day.
The Transition Year students came out of class early to begin preparing the hall for the day. Skipping ropes were counted to make sure there were enough for all the competitors and benches were laid out for the burpees and bench jumps. We taught the first and third years the warm-up routine for the day which was a dance routine to the song Fireball, involving involved marching, jumping, high knees, stretching to the side, twisting side to side and squats. Everyone was laughing and enjoying themselves as they were getting warmed up.
After the break, all students came into the hall and watched from the benches as we taught them the warm-up routine before they joined in. It was then time for the competition.
The representatives from each class went to their various stations and waited for the off. The skipping was first and the teachers competing included Mr Lyons and Ms Malone. It was really funny to watch but after the minute was up, it was time for the plank to start. Claire Joy in TY got the highest with 164 skips in one minute.
I had not been looking forward to the four minutes of pain for the plank, especially when the position had been changed from straight armed to elbow and forearm. I started shaking about a minute and a half in, around when the bench jumps started. I lasted for four and a half minutes which was longer than what I had done in PE and I was really happy with it. Amazingly, Linn Fahy, a first year student, lasted 10 minutes. The whole school cheered for her to keep going and it was unreal to see someone lasting so long.
The burpees happened straight after the bench jumps and Megan Brosnan in TY got the highest number with 28 in a minute. In the bench jumps Tara Murphy from 3 Red was highest with an amazing 125 bounces in one minute. The wall-sit lasted 30 minutes and they were asked to stop because it took so long.
After all the events were over it was time for the sixth years versus the teachers relay. There were three sixth year teams and one teacher team and the students won after a stumble by Mr O ‘Keeffe put the teachers behind.
The final event was the Transition Year students against the teachers in the rope pull which involved one person lying on the ground holding onto the rope and being dragged 20 meters before running back and collecting the next person. There was 12 on the TY team and eight on the teachers’ team so technically, the students won as we finished one person behind.
It was a great afternoon and everyone enjoyed it. Even those not participating in an event had something to watch or someone to cheer on. Hopefully it will become an annual event.
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