Students at a local junior high school have enjoyed the paralympic spirit this week.
Lorne Akins students have been sampling a variety of paralympic activities, such as sledge hockey, wheelchair basketball, seated floor curling, seated volleyball, paralympic swimming, and goal ball. In this game, teams of three blind players line opposite sides of a room and try to score on each other with a ball equipped with internal bells.
The sports have been integrated into physical education classes this week to provide a fun change while also breaking down preconceptions, said assistant principal Roger Scott.
“The kids are gaining a great appreciation for the abilities of the athletes,” he said.
“Trying to do away with the D-word, I think is what we’re trying to do and get the A-word in there, the abilities of all the athletes.”
The Paralympic Winter Games have been going on in Vancouver since March 12 and wrap up Sunday.
The Games received far more mention than usual during the Olympics and are receiving an unprecedented amount of television coverage, said Kim McDonald, executive director of the Paralympic Sports Association in Edmonton. This increased exposure is helping generate awareness and interest in various paralympic sports, especially sledge hockey,
“I’m getting emails and phone calls from individuals interested in doing different sports,” she said.
Her “sledges in schools” program is supplying Lorne Akins with the equipment for sledge hockey.
Putting able-bodied people on a sledge is the best way to build an appreciation that these are real sports and not simply “disabled sports,” she said.
“It brings the same emotions. There’s no difference. The equipment that they use may be the only difference,” she said.
McDonald noted that “stand up” people can and do play sports like sledge hockey.
Lorne Akins students say they’ve had a lot of fun trying the different sports and have learned a lot about paralympic athletes.
“They should get more respect than what they do because it’s so much harder than it looks,” said Grade 8 student Cory Knott, 14. “You have to be real athletic to do it for a full hour.”
Felix Schmidt, 15, learned that being disabled doesn’t bring an end to fun activities.
“If you’re paralyzed from the waist down or you don’t have legs, you can still play sports and have lots of fun,” he said.
Sledge hockey is by far the most popular activity among people looking to try paralympic sports, McDonald said. The sport has been a standout favourite among Lorne Akins students.
“It’s really fun,” said Grade 9 student Andrew Hofmann. “The moving part of it is really easy. To stickhandle and shoot is really, really hard.”
Awareness and appreciation of paralympic sports is increasing but there are still many people to reach and ground to cover before the Paralympics are on par with the Olympics, McDonald admitted. For example, the Canadian broadcast consortium led by CTV aired more than 2,200 hours of Olympic coverage but has devoted just 57 hours to the Paralympics: 30 in French and 27 in English.
A recent Vancouver Sun story about Games coverage garnered a number of online comments showing that some people view the Paralympics with a high level of disdain.
“I don’t see why the Paralympics are even designated Olympics in the first place,” posted one anonymous commenter. “It’s more like a pathetic sporting spectacle by people without the physical tools to do it.”
