What's in Your PE Toolbox? Equipment Essentials for Day 1

Greetings PE Nation!

Ready to start a new school year or new program? Today we explore the nine essential equipment pieces needed to start an effective PE program from scratch, based on experience establishing two programs with minimal resources.

• Sound system is the top priority for making activities more engaging and fun
• Cones serve countless purposes from boundaries to stations to improvised equipment
• Tennis balls provide exceptional value, especially when acquired through donations
• Pool noodles transform games with their safety, affordability, and versatility
• Hula hoops function as collection areas, targets, safety zones, and improvised goals
• Pins provide targets for bowling, hockey, and throwing games
• Gator Skin balls serve multiple functions beyond just dodgeball activities
• Beanbags offer texture variety for throwing, catching, balancing, and point systems
• Poly spots create designated spaces for seating, scoring positions, and game elements

Happy summer,

Dave

Please take 10 seconds to leave a review

Grab a copy of my Ultimate PE equipment checklist 

-Supersizedphysed.com serves as the hub for all resources, articles, and courses

• Free resources include Substack and Medium articles with PE tips, games, and strategies

• A free video course on the "PE-9": principles for improving your PE program

• Free ebook on setting up your PE program, especially helpful for newer teachers

• "High Fives and Empowering Lives" book available as an ebook or paperback

Paperback or download: HERE

Amazon Ebook: HERE

Please take 10 seconds to leave a review

Chapters

• 0:10 Introducing the PE Equipment Starter Pack
• 2:08 Sound System: The PE Game Changer
• 5:13 Cones: Versatile Essentials for Boundaries
• 8:07 Tennis Balls: Affordable Multi-Purpose Tools
• 10:12 Noodles and Hula Hoops
• 13:41 Pins, Gator Skin Balls, and Beanbags
• 18:29 Poly Spots and Equipment Checklist

Transcript

Dave: 0:10

Hello and welcome to the Supersize Phys Ed podcast. My name is Dave and today I want to talk about your PE equipment starter pack. Yes, essential equipment to start at a new school or a new program somewhere. This is going to be level one, just the very bare bones, the basic stuff you need. You absolutely must have, or should have, to start an effective PE program. So, without further ado, here we go. All right, welcome in everybody and welcome to my new listeners. I see you from all over the world. Actually it's pretty cool seeing that. Um, you know, I I know we have different everything, different equipment, different facilities, different everything, but we all can agree on wanting an effective PE program. So, thank you so much for tuning in and, yeah, love to have you. It's been awesome.

Dave: 1:18

So today again I want to talk about what you need to start a program from scratch, and I've done that twice already. I've been to two schools where I just walked in and, yeah, we had stuff, but I also threw out a bunch of garbage too, like a bunch of crap that I just never used and it was old. So these are just for people that are just starting from absolute scratch, and I've seen it before where people post it online. Like you know, help, I have nothing. So here's the bare minimum things I think you need to have. And as you grow your program, I'm going to put out the next couple levels as we go, but this is going to be like level one, you know, from the ground, from ground zero. Here's what you need and we'll make this a boomer. So here's number one here, and we'll make this a boomer. So here's number one. Here we go. All right, number one I'm going to say sound system. So now you can debate me on this one, because when I came into both my programs, they did not use music, and I think that's a crime, it just is. You got to have music, you, you know, maybe it's. I think it's more of a fact than an opinion. So, man, it's just, I think you just need it. It's more fun for the students, especially the little ones, like I do. You know we use music for warm-ups, for stations, for free time, um, just all the time. And you know it just makes everything better. It makes everything more fun. It can start the signal of a class, of your class, like it does with mine.

Dave: 2:51

I make my music montages and that's how we do our warms with music every single day, unless there's like testing going on or something, we can't use music. I mean, it is like every day we start with a song or a little music mix and on fun Fridays the older boys and girls lead the dances. Like, I teach them these moves and I'm not a good dancer at all, but you know basic stuff like YMCA kind of stuff, you know like line dances, things like that, and sometimes we'll use music as a transition to stations, either signaling the end of a station, end of a class. Sometimes we use them during games. We'll play a game called Star Wars and I'll play Star Wars music or Pirates of the Caribbean. It makes everything better, it's more fun right At the very end of class. I don't do this a lot, but sometimes on free days or something we might have a few extra minutes and I'll play like a name, that tune kind of game. So you know I just it's fun and again, it helps signal different things as well.

Dave: 3:58

You know, in this case, or in my case, you know if the music's on during a game, they can freely. You know, if they have to go bathroom, get a drink, do what they have to do without you know asking, say, hey, can I? You know, whatever, it's, just go. If the music's you know off, then they know it's time to listen to the coach or we're doing a group. You know strategy, you know talk kind of thing. So you know, music is a great thing to have and that is the first thing I think you should have.

Dave: 4:26

And in my case I had a sound system, a huge sound system. It's more built for what I was told like a high school stadium. It was really loud at my former school and I didn't have really. I do have one at my current school, but it's not very good and it's not wireless. So I just have a you know block rocker that I bring out and you know I bought with school money and you know I use it every day.

Dave: 4:47

So, no excuses, get some music, let's go. That's number one. All right, before I get to number two, I want to remind you that you can hear some birds and if you're hearing beeping, sometimes it's the garbage truck is here, my neighborhood. Um, it's not in your head. So sorry, I'm on my little an eye recording this. So yeah, anyways, let's get to number two.

Dave: 5:13

Number two is cones, and they're I mean, they're just the basic need for any program. Even if you're inside, you still need cones, just you know, for a lot of things, but if you're outside they're essential. So here's some of the ways we use cones and, by the way, I get lots of different kinds of cones. I get the real cheap orange domes like you use in soccer, or even the bigger cones, like tall cones, to put hula hoops over, things like that. So here's some of the main ways we use cones, first of all for boundaries of a game. And it's some of the main ways we use cones, first of all for boundaries of a game. And it's funny teaching kindergarten boundaries in a game. It's like we put those cones out there for a reason. I promise you do not go outside the boundaries and you know we'll try to make it a game like OK, this is Gotham City and you have to stay within the boundaries of the city and they'll go off and run around the field and whatever, but it's to work on the boundaries.

Dave: 6:05

Obviously, with cones we put station numbers over top of them, especially on field days, things like that. I have some things you drape over the cones with numbers and even station titles, things like that you can slip the cards in there, so things you can put over top of the cones. With our obstacle course we make tunnels by connecting broken who hoops, like half who hoops, and we connect them with the cones. Uh, you can make actually I didn't put this in my article but and I'm going to link the article in the show notes, but in the article um, I did not put this and I just thought of this um, you know, you could put, uh, jump ropes over top of them, like connect them and make almost like a little net kind of thing. Or you can connect anything to the things two cones, like make a line over top of it so you can hit over and pick a ball or something like that. All right, like I said, you could put, like, if you have a big one, a big cone, you could kind of put the hula hoops over top of them. When the kids are done for the day In certain games we do that you can use them as batting tees.

Dave: 7:09

When we do baseball, our baseball unit, we use the large tees or large cones as tees because, as I'm sure a lot of you have had trouble in the past with tees, they break really easily because the kids are taking sledgehammers to them and they're not very accurate. So definitely use those for tees. Sometimes I'll use the soccer-style cones as like ball rests, like I'll put them on top. I use the brain balls and I'll just rest them on top of the soccer cones. And even like cone-flipping games, like water bottle flipping, we will use the you know little cones for that. So just get a lot of cones, a lot of colors, a lot of sizes and along with the colors, like I like when I saw my variety here, you know that could designate okay, the red team, go over here by the red cone, and you know purple and so forth, and we do that a lot. So that's number two. You definitely need a lot of cones.

Dave: 8:07

Number three is tennis balls. I have a ton of tennis balls and now if you don't call your local tennis club I did this and ask, just be like, hey, are there any tennis balls you're going to throw out? I'm just willing to donate and I've done this a couple of of times and you might call around and be like, nah, we don't have anything. But if you get a good connection, which I did the guy's like, hey, yeah, just let me know Anytime every couple of months I might have some for you. He gave me a couple of garbage bags full of tennis balls and they're not going to give you the best ones, but they also didn't give you or didn't give me like garbage ones. They gave me some good ones. They're just not brand new.

Dave: 8:47

So I use tennis balls for a lot of reasons. So here's some of the reasons or some of the things I use tennis balls for. I use them for points in a game, like let's say, okay, go grab a tennis ball, bring it back. That's like treasure. I use them for like a rainy day under the pavilion, because everybody, I have enough where every child can have one. So then we'll do things like we'll roll to a partner or we'll bounce and catch or we'll you know they'll kind of follow me doing the cha-cha slide, you know, bouncing a ball and things like that. So again, it's something that every child can have. If you have a lot of them and there's not a lot of equipment that I have that every child will have one. If I have 100 kids, but I have well over 100 tennis balls, um, you use for bowling, for hockey. If you don't have any. The orange balls, um, and speaking hockey, I use them in my game called pinball, which, um, these are all in the article I wrote. If you want to check out the show notes, the game pinball. I just dump a ton of tennis balls on the court and the kids are just shooting at pins and then we use them for golf. That's our golf balls. From First Tee. They use the clubs to strike tennis balls. I'm sure there's more that I use them for, that I'm not even thinking of right now, but tennis balls are just great and you need to have a lot of them, all right.

Dave: 10:12

Number four is noodles. Yeah, noodles make everything better. They're cheap, safe, fun, you know, especially during the COVID time. You know, just tagging, and we use them a lot for tagging, by the way, and here's some of the ways besides tagging, we use them and, as a matter of fact, when we do tag, I usually cut them in half. Um, you use them as a baton if you're passing them, like a half noodle to pass. Um, you can use them for balancing and throwing. Uh, again, usually half noodles, just kind of balance on your hand or balance, however you want to do it, and you know they walk around things like that, or throwing, like a javelin that could be a half or whole noodle, um, collecting as treasure. You want to cut them up, and I don't do this a lot because we're we have a lot of wind, but if you're inside, you cut them up and they're treasure.

Dave: 10:59

Or, and as a matter of fact, with treasure, the next thing is stacking them so you can stack the little. They're called noodle bits. Stacking them is so you can stack the little. They're called noodle bits. Stacking them is just a great um, I can't we. I don't do it a lot because we have a lot of wind, but if you're inside it'd be a great game. Uh, or just any game, just add that you know little layer to it. There's different noodle channels. You can do just pull, balance, helicopter hopping over it, um, or even using as a jump rope. So, um, when I cut them, I use a steak knife or scissors and I'll usually mark a line on them beforehand to be as accurate as I can. So definitely get a lot of noodles. They are a game changer.

Dave: 11:40

Number five are hula hoops. I am not good at hula hooping and I'm going to throw jump roping in here. I didn't put this in the article. But hula hoops and jump ropes. I am good at jump roping. I'm pretty good. I'm not great. I don't do all the tricks and stuff. But, um, hula hooping I cannot get it at all. My mom is actually really good at hula hooping. She's won good contests on cruise ships and stuff like that and I I have a lot of kids that can hula hoop for hours. That is not me yet. Right, you got to use the word yet I'm not going to give up. They've tried to teach me before a lot of the kids and they're very, very sweet, like here, coach, here's how you do it. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I just can't do it.

Dave: 12:17

But hula hoops are great for a lot of different things. So I use hula hoops for a place to collect and organize my treasure. In many games like bring it back to the hoop and you know they can organize things. We have the small tag ed balls with the names and or not names, but the letters and numbers on them and they make you know. They put them in the hula hoop and they make different words. You can use them as top golf targets, like when you're golfing there's targets, beanbag toss targets In a tagging game where you slide the hoop. You slide it like soccer style To make hula huts or castles, whatever you want to call them, as spinning timers, as a basketball net for younger students who can't reach the goal, like you put on the rim, and as safety spots in certain games, like certain capture flag type games. We might add some safety zones where it's a hula hoop or the floor is lava kind of thing, where you have to make it across the river or whatever. Those are safety zones or hoops. Just use your imagination and have a bunch of different colors and everything. So yeah, hula hoops, game changer.

Dave: 13:32

Number five All right, right, number six are pins, and I'm always looking for a good pin, like always most of the pins I have. Okay, here's the pins I have. I have actual, real bowling pins. They're old and they've been there probably 20 years in my pavilion or my office kind of thing, and they're heavy, they're really heavy, so we don't use them a thing. And they're heavy, they're really heavy, so we don't use them a lot. I mean, they're real bowling pins. Then I have some that are way too light. I have plastic ones. I have um, kind of like foam ones, like nerf kind of things, and those ones break all the time. By the way, I use those a lot, but they they fall over in the wind. Kids hit them too hard in the neck kind of area of it of them and I have to duct tape them all the time. I have the thin ones, the real thin ones again, the wind if. If you're inside, you don't have some of these problems. But I have a lot of problems with the wind and pins. So the best ones are the ones you can fill with sand or water, and I have those at my former school, I think I found similar ones and I just got them at the end of the school year. So I'm going to use them next this coming school year.

Dave: 14:36

In the meantime I created a game and again, this is all in the episode notes, the show notes called Splat Ball. I filled tennis ball cans just a little bit of the way with water, so they're not too light, they're not too heavy, they're perfect as far as the weight. But then, hey, this is an outside game, right, I'm talking outside. When the kids hit them, they fall over and they usually burst open for playing hockey or, just like with gator skin balls, throw them at the pins or even foaling like football bowling. They knock them over and they splat and the kids love them and fortunately, if you're outside playing it on the court during a hot season which we're in Florida, it's almost always hot it dries really fast.

Dave: 15:21

But anyways, you've got to get some kind of pins. They're just great for any kind of target game and you know, again, it's just something you need to have, something I use all the time for soccer, for hockey, for bowling, for anything. So get some pins, let's go. That's number six. All right. Number seven are Gator Skin Balls, and this is not a dodgeball debate, I could go there right now, but these are great for, like, a lot of things Gator Skin Balls are. I mean, I use them for a ton of different games, a ton of different activities, and here's some of them I use them to bowl with, obviously to roll to a partner, like just roll or throw back and forth to a partner, especially the little ones. And, by the way, if they, if the I guess the skin part of it comes off, I still keep them. They're really soft and it's great for kindergarten. I use them as a pilopolo ball and a gaga ball. I use them to throw at targets. Again, we'll talk about the pins and things like that. We just said To collect as treasure. Sometimes you have to go collect the little gator skin balls or even the big ones and put them in a hoop or on a dot on a poly spot kind of thing. I use them in our game Rollout, I use them as a chook ball or handball, any game where the kids are passing down the court. I use them a lot in PE. So get a bunch for your program, all right.

Dave: 16:47

Number eight are beanbags, and you could start off without beanbags. You could just use the tennis balls that are more free, I guess. But beanbags, you know, add that extra color, they add the extra just, I guess, texture and throwing and catching ability or just something different than tennis balls. So here's a few ways we use beanbags for self and partner toss and balancing. By the way, especially the little kids, kindergarten first, like balancing them on their shoulders, on your elbows, just balancing beanbags on your head as you're walking. Obviously you use them as a cornhole-type game into hula hoops. We use them for stacking in relay races and I use them a lot as treasure, kind of like tennis balls, but in my my game, treasure hunters or porch pirates, we use them a lot as far as collecting treasure. Again, different colors you can even have I do this a lot as well where I'll say, okay, if you have purple. Like at the end of the round I'll say, if you have purple, they're worth five points, where everything else worth one, or if you have orange, they're worth whatever points. Um, so we is worth one, or if you have orange, they're worth whatever points. So we use beanbags a lot.

Dave: 17:57

Like I said, like all these things, we use them a lot and they're very versatile. That's another thing I want to make sure with these equipment, we use them for a lot of different things. I don't want to just get something that we use one time for one unit for like five kids. Like it's got to be something big and bold and something we use a lot. So beanbags are one of those things. And that is number eight.

Dave: 18:16

All right, the last one today is poly spots, and again, they aren't 100% necessary, but I think these are definitely a level one element to have for many reasons. First, we do have dots for our children to sit on when they come under the pavilion, and rubber poly spots can serve as that purpose. If you have like a gym, gymnasium floor, just put, you know, spread the poly spots out, you know, and, uh, you know the kids can sit on them, they can stand on them. Um, we use them for a lot of different kind of ways, um. So here's another, here's other ways we use them.

Dave: 18:54

We use them as points and like a make it take it kind of game in soccer, basketball, hockey. You know, you make a shot from that spot and you bring it back and then we'll say or I'll say okay again, if you have kind of kind of like the last one with the beanbags, if you have, blue ones are worth five and red ones are worth two, and so you could use those as points, things like that. You could use them to hide coins under the spots or cards like playing cards, memory match kind of games. You could use them as a Frisbee. They can just play catch. If you don't have Frisbees, you could use them again as like a line order.

Dave: 19:32

Now we do use them in a game, in our Capture Flag game, where there are going to be three people in the scoring area to get the football, and in this case we're talking about football, I say capture flag, but it's really football and they have to be in a line order. There's only three people on a dot, so we'll put the dots out there on the field and they'll have to take turns, like the first person has a chance at the ball, then the next person moves up to the first spot and another person can come in. So, uh, the final thing, I think, is, if you're, if you ever played chicken taco tag um, I think I got that from mike. Uh, michael graham, mike graham, you wrap, uh, rubber chicken around it and, uh, you play tag with, so it becomes a wrap. We just use them a lot and they're fun, they're multifunctional. And that is number nine.

Dave: 20:26

And now it is time for your cowbell tip of the day. All right, everybody. So your tip of the day is to grab a copy of my ultimate pe equipment checklist. It is in the show notes and it gives you all the like level one, two and three, which we'll talk about soon. It's all the musts and I'll add to that as we go.

Dave: 20:54

There's some things that you might think that are hey, I don't agree, or I think this should be added or taken away, and I'd love to hear from you as well on that. So definitely reach out to me if you want to add or subtract to that or just add your opinions on that. I'd love to hear from you. But definitely grab that in the show notes if you want an extra little checklist to take with you to school this year and that is your cowbell tip of the day. Thank you everybody for tuning in today. I really do appreciate it, as always. Go to supersciencescom for more information. Thank you everybody for tuning in today. I really do appreciate it, as always. Go to supersciencescom for more information and definitely go to the show notes for all the links I've talked about in here the ultimate PE equipment checklist and anything that I've talked about in the article. You can grab it in there. So, without further ado, pe Nation have a great day, week, weekend, summer whenever you listen to this and let's keep pushing our profession forward. Thank you.