Supporting Student Athletes
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Cooler mornings, school buses on their routes, apples, pumpkins, and football—It’s that time of year again!
It’s time to give your students the opportunity to learn and practice academic skills that will allow them to be productive citizens in our society. Some subjects you teach provide your students with skills that they will use for the rest of their lives, and I believe the subject of English should be at the top of the list.
When you study the scope and sequence of the Shurley English curriculum, you can see each grade level and how the skills introduced build on each other to develop competent, confident communicators. It is good practice to preview a curriculum’s scope and sequence to see what skills will be taught throughout the grade level. Educators are often surprised at the depth of the Shurley English Scope and Sequence, so I strongly recommend taking a look at it. Teaching students how to create a complete sentence is at the core of our curriculum, and I would venture to say that’s true for most English curricula.
While most educators are surprised with the number of skills our primary students learn, I was shocked to witness a junior college (JuCo) student struggle to know where to place periods in his writing. I watched the story unfold as I watched the Emmy nominated docuseries on Netflix, called “Last Chance U.”
The show is about a rising football program that highlights the team’s challenges on and off the field. The participants are part of a junior college program that was designed to help talented athletes get another chance at earning a scholarship to a larger university. Some of the athletes had been players on big-name, Division 1 collegiate football teams, but let-go for one reason or another. The series is unfiltered and often uncomfortable to watch due to the raw truth of the reality of so many student athletes around our country.
In one episode, a star player meets with his English teacher to review his writing. He admits, “I don’t know where to put the period. I just find spots to put the dot.” The teacher didn’t judge or ridicule him; she was there to support him, teach him, and have his back.
As I watched the scene unfold, I realized that this young man didn’t just slip through the cracks of the educational system. It appears that more value was placed on his athletic talent than on his ability to communicate effectively when writing. He had been passed-on to the next grade year after year without learning these skills! Learning how to write with competence and confidence is a life skill. How could something so basic and vital to communication be overlooked? It breaks my heart to imagine the academic and possible social stress this young man must have endured. Luckily, he got a second chance!
I am a former collegiate athlete and educator, and I believe everyone in this country has the right to an education…and that is our job. Fewer than 2 percent of NCAA student-athletes go on to be professional athletes. There are nearly half a million NCAA student-athletes, and most of them will go pro in something other than sports.
Shurley English can give your students the chance to win on and off the field. Be a “pro” at what you do, and teach Shurley English with fidelity, and always remember… you’re teaching a life-skill!
