Tutorial House
Physical Education is a compulsory subject in Tutorial House. In order to meet the requirements of UNIS graduation, students must pass seven semesters of PE during the High School years. This is divided as follows: Tutorial One to Tutorial Three have two semesters per year and Tutorial Four one semester. If a student fails any semester, he/she will be required to take a make-up unit in order to satisfy graduation requirements. Throughout the four years of Tutorial House, students have the option of becoming more diverse by experiencing new sports and recreational activities or becoming more specialized by studying areas of interest.
Tutorial One
The course contributes to the overall education of our students by helping them to lead full and valuable lives through encouragement of purposeful physical activity and development of a greater understanding of the relationships among health, fitness and sport. Students will participate in a variety of sports during which they will analyze and incorporate health, fitness concepts and basic training principles related to exercise, skill performance and training.
Throughout the year, we aim to develop the student's spirit of success and competition both as an individual and as a team player, whilst encouraging the principles of teamwork, cooperation, fair play, honesty and responsibility. We will continually focus on the importance of physical fitness and healthy living, giving each student the knowledge to be able to institute their own body maintenance programs.
Tutorial Two
In Tutorial Two, students will be given the opportunity to start to specialize in areas of interest. We offer a variety of teaching groups based on aesthetic, fitness activities, team sports or recreational activities. Regardless of their choice, participation within this course will create an increased level of skill in each activity that will be necessary at a higher level of competition or recreational involvement. We hope that students attain a higher degree of physical fitness and, through understanding and knowledge, gain the desire to continue self-fitness throughout life.
Tutorial Three
By the time the students get to Tutorial Three, it is hoped that they have developed a range of physical competence and confidence and the ability to use these to perform in a range of activities.
The Tutorial Three students, with guidance and support, design their own Physical Education program for the year. Students choose their sports and recreational activities based on their level of interest and expertise. We, therefore, hope to further provide opportunities for students to be creative, cooperative and competitive and to face up to different challenges as individuals and in groups and teams. The course continues to promote positive attitudes towards active and healthy lifestyles. In the past, we have offered badminton, volleyball, touch rugby, fitness training, aerobics, dance and yoga, to name but a few.
Our emphasis as a department for Tutorial Three and Tutorial Four is twofold: physical and mental development and fulfillment. We continue to promote the fact that physically, exercise improves your cardiovascular functions by strengthening and enlarging the heart, causing greater elasticity of the blood vessels, increasing oxygen throughout your body and lowering your blood levels of fats such as cholesterol and triglycerides. In addition to reducing stress, exercising also decreases the chance of developing heart conditions, strokes or high blood pressure, to name just a few benefits! We are all very aware of the physical benefits but frequently forget the mental benefits. Often we hear students asking to have time off from PE as they are stressed and behind with work. In class we aim to provide a stress-free environment where students appreciate that exercise provides an outlet for negative emotions such as frustration, anger and irritability, promoting a more positive mood and outlook that may build up as they embark on their IB program. There is so much research supporting the fact that regular exercise helps students retain and recall information and improves mood by producing positive biochemical changes in the body and brain. Regular exercise reduces the amount of adrenal hormones your body releases in response to stress so why would any one want to miss Physical Education?