Aruba turns PE classes into badminton sessions

March 14, 2022

The Aruba Badminton Federation (ABF) has been focused on promoting badminton to schoolchildren via the annual National School Olympics, at which the sport has been on the programme for three years. 

The two projects each year to introduce and encourage more kids to pick up a racket are: 

  1. Pre-competition compact workshops
  2. ‘Gymles ta bira badminton les’ (turning PE classes into badminton classes)

With the main aim being introducing the sport to more children, another such project took place in September 2021, where 450 students from two primary schools participated in the ‘Gymles to bira badminton les’. The year before, it attracted 600 secondary school students. 

On 2-4 September, a Shuttle Time Teachers course and a Shuttle Time Tutors course were held following interest from schools around the island.  

Together with the PE teachers at the interested schools, a full week of PE classes were turned into badminton classes.  

For most kids, it was their first time having a real badminton class. Also, for the PE teachers, it was refreshing to bring a “new sport” into their teaching programme.  

The now Shuttle Time-certified teachers were able to use their new skills and the Shuttle Time app to prepare the students for the School Olympics, which in turn empowered and motivated them to teach badminton at their schools. 

ABF also supported the schools with badminton material.  

For the federation, Shuttle Time is an excellent tool to develop the sport on the island as other PE teachers are encouraged to participate in future programmes.  

In parallel, every year new schoolkids get introduced to badminton, and the enthusiastic ones return to the yearly competition, while some even found badminton clubs.