The Troy University Kinesiology and Health Promotion Department has found a way to get their students some valuable teaching experience by interacting with the local homeschool community.

Eighteen families are involved, including 45 children in all. KHP students normally spend their hours teaching in the public school system, but due to scheduling concerns, professor Lana Johnson came up with a way that local students would come to them.

“I was trying to figure out a way my students could get longer quality-time teaching,” Johnson said. “We have several families in our church who let me borrow their children to practice on and the idea came to me to offer organized physical education to the area homeschool children.”

Troy students are teaching the 45 students brand new games, as well as Track and Field, archery and soccer.

“We are in our third week of physical education and my Troy students are doing a wonderful job of teaching,” Johnson said. “The experience that they are getting is more than I could ever teach them with getting hands-on experience.

The Troy students aren’t the only ones getting valuable experience with the program. The visiting students are getting an opportunity to make new relationships and learn to play sports that would have been unavailable at home.

“The kids love having new experiences,” said parent Amy Gladwell. “They are learning team-building activities, building friendships as well as activities that our children wouldn’t normally experience such as track and field. It’s a great experience for both the college students and our children.”

The program is still in its infancy and Johnson couldn’t be happier with the support and confidence of her department and she hopes this program will continue to grow in the upcoming years.

“My department was very supportive of this program and assisted me in getting the correct permission needed to make this a reality,” Johnson said. “I would love to see this expand. I do have a lot of ideas, but for right now, we will give this a chance to get going and we will see where it takes us.”