Time:
60 minutes
Equipment:
Beanbags or Koosh balls, large rubber balls, racquets, foam or low pressure balls, tail balls, spots and teaching cable
1. Welcome/roll call (3 min.)
2. Warm-up
Run the lines (5 min.)
Everyone follows the leader along the lines of the court, changing forms of locomotion each time they reach a new line. This is a good way to teach the lines of the court while children:
- Walk fast
- March
- Jog
- Hop on one foot, then the other
Do animal imitations:
- Swing your arms like the trunk of an elephant
- Gallop lightly like a pony, then heavily like a horse
- Take tiny steps like a mouse
- Flap your arms like a bird
Slow stretches (2 min.)
Do the following stretches slowly six times each, counting aloud to keep the class in sync:
- Roll the neck left and then right
- Circle the arms forward and then backward
- Alternate raising the hands to the sky with bending to touch the toes
- Trunk twists with airplane arms and feet still
- Windmill toe touches -- reach the right hand to the left foot and the left hand to the right foot
3. Motor skills
Catching and throwing skills (5 min.)
Pair each child with a parent-coach to:
1. Roll a ball back and forth, to the left and right
2. Roll the ball to the left and right so the child has to track it, trap it and roll it back
3. Toss a tail ball for the child to catch after two bounces and toss back underhand. After repeated success, children should catch the ball after one bounce
Racquet introduction (3 min.)
Teach the children to hug their racquets for safety when they’re not active in a drill.
Explain the racquet parts and how some correspond to body parts: Head, face, strings, throat and handle/grip.
Racquet holds (3 min.)
Let the children get used to handling their racquets by holding them in the following ways:
- Use two hands
- One hand
- In front of the body
- Behind
- High in the sky
- Close to the court without touching it
- Palm up
- Palm down
- Touching strings only
Racquet passes (5 min.)
Children can learn to maneuver the racquet by moving it from hand to hand:
- Around the body
- Around one leg and both legs
- Around the head
- As figure eights around the legs
- Doing the above drills standing back-to-back with a partner
Balance drill (3 min.)
Have the children balance a beanbag or Koosh ball on their strings and walk forward, backward, right and left at the coach’s signal. Then have them follow a leader around the court.
4. Racquet skills
Forehand groundstroke demonstration (5 min.)
Demonstrate the forehand and have the children shadow the shot, beginning with the body turned sideways and the racquet slightly back, ready to swing.
Forehands on dangling ball (10 min.)
Set up a teaching cable with five dangling balls. Spots are positioned so children stand sideways with their racquets slightly back and contact the ball in front. Have the children:
1. Hit a stationary ball steadied between hits by a parent-coach. Count successful hits and rotate children after five or 10 consecutive hits.
2. Hit a ball gently swung by a parent-coach, who catches the ball while the child gets in ready position to hit again.
Bounce and hit (5-10 min.)
Children line up on spots along a line, standing sideways with their racquets back. Instructors or parent-coaches drop a large rubber ball, foam or low pressure ball in front of each child, saying, "bounce, hit" to help children who are struggling with timing. Children hit and retrieve their ball(s) and return to their spot to hit again. (If coaches hold two balls, children get more hits.)
5. Wrap-up/homework (2 min.)
Practice suggestions:
- Balance a ball on the strings and walk back and forth.
- Roll a ball back and forth with a parent.
- Practice your forehand with a parent using the bounce and hit drill.
