When I present at conferences, one of the most common questions is, "How can I teach sportsmanship to my students?" This question is usually followed up by a short anecdote about their student arguing, cheating accusations, and unfair play. This question pops up on Facebook groups all the time. In the Montessori setting, the question of sportsmanship could be restated as, “How do I teach Grace and Courtesy in PE?” This raises the question: Why is it so challenging to teach sportsmanship?

As quickly as possible, come up with a definition for sportsmanship right now. If you are having trouble creating a succinct definition, imagine how much harder it is for the students to do it. Don't feel bad, though, because the concept is hard to understand. We (teachers and students) do a much better job describing how to show good sportsmanship or what poor sportsmanship looks like. What we are after is articulating sportsmanship as a set of beliefs, not a list of behaviors.

For our lower elementary students, we define sportsmanship as "be fun to play with, be fun to play against.” If they can follow this simple statement, they will exhibit 99% of the behaviors we hope to see out of someone who we would consider “a good sport.”
Reasons why we want to be fun to play with include:

• Being fun to play with gives that person more opportunities to play. If people like playing with you, you will get more invitations to play. This improves your chance of making friends because you will be invited to play more often.

• Coaches like players who are fun to play with because they enhance team unity because they are good teammates. If the coach likes you, you have a better chance of making the team and getting more playing time.

• When a parent sees that you play well with their child, they will be more likely to invite you over to their house to play, invite you to birthday parties, or other events.

• Being fun to play with involves as many teammates as possible while striving for success. Therefore, the more people feel involved, the more enjoyable the experience will be.

• Players who are fun to play with make their teammates feel good. Whether incorporating them more in the overall gameplay, complimenting them on a job well done, or offering encouragement during mistakes, all these actions make teammates feel good. There is a famous quote that students don't remember what teachers taught them; they remember how a teacher made them feel. The same goes for good teammates.

  Reasons why we “want to be fun to play against” include:

• Try your best and don’t quit. Someone who works hard and tries their best

encourages higher-level competition with whomever they play. When the level of competition is close, games are more fun. Playing against an opponent of a similar skill level encourages growth, making one a better player over the long

term. Playing against someone who quits halfway through a game is not fun. It is

no fun to play against someone who is not trying.

• Knowing when to play your hardest and when to play for fun. Someone who

  plays their hardest is fun to play with as long as everyone else tries hard. If everyone gives their best individual effort, the group has a better chance of success. If one person is not trying hard and everyone else is playing their best, that teammate is not fun to play with. Conversely, if everyone plays for fun, and one person plays seriously, they will not be enjoyable to play with because they will be too critical of their teammates and not have as much fun.

• Players who are fun to play against are respectful to opponents, coaches, and refs before, during, and after the game.

• Make the game as fair as possible. When we participate in sports for our school or club, we have individuals dedicated to promoting fairness, such as referees, umpires, and officials. We don't have that same thing at recess or when just playing for fun. Therefore, we must collaborate to form the fairest teams and enforce the agreed-upon rules fairly. Players who are fun to play against do not cheat

• Players who are fun to play against do not brag when they win and do not complain when they lose. Instead, they say 'good game' to the players, coaches, and referees, regardless of the outcome. A famous sports saying is "We win or we learn." Every loss presents an opportunity to improve if we choose to use it as a learning experience.

Upper elementary is when many children begin competitive sports, especially playing for their schools. Physical Education teachers generally notice that older students like more competitive elements. This can be particularly challenging for those who are not as skilled, as the disparity between their abilities and those of the best players is more pronounced. Making sure we are fun to play with and against becomes even more crucial. However, it would be a mistake to shy away from competition. We must highlight to the children that competition can bring out more effort and performance from an individual than without it.

An example that I like to use is a running race. If we ask a child to run around a track as fast as they can, they will complete the lap in a certain amount of time. However, if someone is running next to them and the race is close, it is almost guaranteed that the same child will run faster because the other runner provides a comparison of the performance they are trying to beat. Even if the child loses the race, it does not matter because they ran faster than they previously did without the competition. Did that child really lose if they got faster? No! They are now faster than they were before. The comparison should be between their previous self and their current self. However, having competition is what unleashed that extra effort to become better. Our goal is for the child to recognize the unpleasant feelings that competition can evoke and understand that these feelings are priming the body to perform at its best. If someone doesn't feel nervous before a game or race, they probably don't care about the outcome. But if someone feels nervous, they care and will try hard, and those nervous feelings bring with them the energy needed to work hard.

The mantra, "be fun to play with, be fun to play against," works very well with younger-aged children. However, we need a little more nuance with upper elementary students. They are smarter, older, and much more social than their younger counterparts. This means that instead of having a very black-and-white understanding of sportsmanship, we have to exist in the grey. An action can be perceived as good or beneficial by one person and insulting by another. More sophisticated students are likely to have more disagreements. How do we handle the situation?

Here is the new mantra to layer on top of “Be Fun to Play With, Be Fun to Play Against.” See Both Sides. Both parties need to do their best to understand their own feelings and perspective, and then imagine what the other person is thinking or feeling. We must practice a skill called “empathy.” When both parties express why they did what they did, it clarifies intentions and removes the idea that someone was just being "mean."

For example, a player who criticizes an unaware teammate wants the teammate to play their hardest, which helps the whole team. However, the criticized teammate usually has their feelings hurt and does not want to play, which is an unacceptable outcome. When this player expresses how the criticism impacted them, this will help the criticizer grow by changing their approach to get their teammate to try harder. With a softer approach, the teammate will pay more attention, which is what they want, and the other player will not have any hurt feelings in the process.

However, in this exact scenario, let's try to understand the other perspective. What if the criticism came after many failed attempts because the teammate is not trying their best, or they were distracted, perhaps talking to other teammates and not paying attention to the game at hand? Playing with an individual like this is frustrating, and now we at

least understand the source of the criticism. We would want the frustrated teammate to use language that the other person will hear appropriately. If we use harsh language, the message gets lost through the emotions of anger and sadness when we feel like we are being attacked.

When we move on to middle school, they should still know the old mantras, but we will expound on this idea by adding the concept of time. For our older students, sportsmanship is also valuing the long term over the short term. We start with examples within sports and explain why valuing the long term over the short term is a good idea. Then, if there is adequate time for discussion, we can see how this mantra can be applied to other areas of life (relationships, money, business, etc.).

For example, in sports, I use these reasons why we should value the long term over the short term:

• The long-term goal of a sport is to win a championship; the short-term goal is to win a game. The championship is much more important than any particular game. We don't want to do anything to win a game that might jeopardize our chances of winning the championship.

• Maintaining relationships with our teammates becomes very important. We seek ways to maximize our potential and that of our teammates, and positive interactions foster effective results. Friction between players always infects the whole team dynamic, reducing the chance of overall success. Berating a teammate who did poorly in one game will carry over into other games. We know that poor- performing players often feel terrible about their performance. Still, those bad feelings should be temporary as they work hard to improve. When external negative feelings are exacerbated by overly critical teammates, an association between those feelings and the teammates is created, and that will not be temporary. Propping up players who are hard on themselves reassures them that the team has their back after a poor performance. This will enhance team unity, improving the chances of team cohesion and success.

• An opponent today may be a teammate tomorrow. Someone that we played against in grade school may be our teammate in high school. They may even become our best friends. Therefore, we want to avoid making a decision that could jeopardize that future relationship and damage our reputation.

• Winning a game by cheating or dirty play has two severe negative ramifications that make it much harder to win in the long term. First, a team that cheats will create a reputation as cheaters with other teams and referees. This is especially true if a team is caught cheating because its reputation has been tarnished. The second reason cheating prevents long-term success is that the victory gained through cheating will not ultimately improve the team's performance over the long run. If they do not improve, they will lose games in the future that could have been won if they had worked on those weaknesses.

• We must accept defeat, take responsibility, and refrain from blaming others (such as referees, coaches, or cheating allegations). When we lose, that is an opportunity to learn from our mistakes. When we learn from our mistakes, we can improve. The loss they suffered today can be a catalyst for the improvement they make tomorrow, which could be the difference between winning and losing a championship in the future. Losing is an essential part of the learning process. We must learn new things to improve, which usually comes from overcoming adversity.

Every level of the game has an element of risk vs. reward and can be played successfully in multiple ways. However, the best way to play the game would involve as many teammates as possible. The lower elementary version is simple and a lot of fun. We ramp up the difficulty for upper elementary, and the middle school version has a twist at the end. I start every year at every grade level with this lesson. For my Montessori teachers, sportsmanship is a combination of grace and courtesy that needs to be established right from the start of the year. For my general education teachers, sportsmanship is SEL. Whenever I attend SHAPE America conferences, every topic emphasizes the virtues of SEL. Use this lesson to set the tone of expectations with sportsmanship and automatically integrate SEL into your practice from day one.

Materials:

• An ample open space (such as a gym or field)

• Several basketball hoops or 55-gallon waste bins

• Large yoga balls (upper elementary and middle school)

• Rubber Disc Dots (lower elementary)

• V olleyballs

• Hula-hoops (upper elementary and middle school, if outside)

Minimum Number of Students Needed: This game requires your entire class to be practical. If you have a class of four, that is okay, but it really shines with sixteen or more.

Prior Knowledge: None. This is the first lesson you do with your students to reintroduce the concept of “sportsmanship.”