Year 3 – 4 | SunSmart Balance
Protecting My Skin full resource download | Concept 5: Taking positive action to reduce risk: Promoting and actioning effective sun protection strategies download
Background
SunSmart balance is a super fun game that involves students balancing a variety of SunSmart objects on different body
parts, such as balancing a sunscreen tube upright on your palm.
Physical literacy elements include:
- Stability/balance
- Motivation
- Coordination
- Self-regulation (emotions)
- Reasoning
Resources
- Range of SunSmart protective objects
Instructions
- Students balance various sun protective objects to see which shapes are easiest to balance.
- Students use different body parts to balance the objects, such as the palm or back of their hand, back of their knee,
foot, elbow or chin. - Students count how long they can balance the object before it wobbles or falls. Record the total number of seconds
achieved on each attempt can be added together, e.g., Attempt one = 5 seconds plus Attempt two = 12 seconds plus
Attempt three = 9 seconds plus Attempt four = 4 seconds to achieve the total of 30 seconds.
Variation 1
- Relays: Divide class into teams and use one sun safe item per team as the baton
Variation 2
- Students try walking or lying down and getting back up again while balancing their object
Variation 3
- Introduce rules such as using a non-preferred hand to balance the objects
Variation 4
- Students ‘jump’ the balancing object from one body part to another (e.g., one hand to another)
- Students work in pairs to pass balanced objects to each other using the ’jump’ method.
Physical literacy elements include:
- What objects balance the best, or the worst?
- Where were your eyes focused to try to maintain balance?
- What part of the object did you select as the balancing point?
- What strategies did you use when you found it challenging?
- What can affect your focus in this activity?