If your not doing anything on Saturday, March 22nd you should come down to Wayne State University for a fun day that is full of activities that are specially designed for the people with Visual Impairments. The Non-Profit I'm with, Camp Abilities Michigan, is putting it on for a disability awareness day! Anyone can come and participate, volunteer or observe. All you need to do is register online at Activity Day Sign Up. From our Activity Day, we hope that you walk away with an experience that will change your perspective on people with disabilities forever. Through these activities you will start to understand the impressive amount of concentration and hard work it takes to engage in these sports. Hopefully this will be an insightful day for everyone and you will gain a new sense of respect for people with disabilities.
We will start by explaining all the rules and passing out eye shade masks to the participants. We will be playing 2 games designed for the visually impaired and we will also have a few extra fun activities. Here is a description of the two sports we will be playing.
Goal Ball:
Goal Ball is a game currently being played at the Paraylmpics. Every player in these games wears a eye shade mask, to prevent any advantages. The objective of the game is to roll a ball, which contains bells in it, past the opponents goal line. To stop the ball the defense must try to stop the ball using their entire bodies. For this game the player needs to utilize their sense of hearing to block the ball as well as communicate with their team. A lot of strategy can develop if you are communicating well with your team. This is personally my favorite of any Paraylmpic sport I've played before.
Beep Baseball/Kickball:
Beep Baseball and Beep Kickball are played very similarly. Like Goal Ball, all the players must wear a eye shade mask. The game requires a beeping ball, two beeping bases, and outfield place mats. When the batter hits the beeping ball, he runs to the base that makes a loud buzzing noise. While this is going on, a sighted person calls out different numbers for the outfield to go and try to find the ball, only one person is called from the outfield at a time for safety reasons. If the outfielder finds the ball before the batter touches the base, than the batter is out! This is another game that focuses on one's sense of listening, but with this game there are other events taking place and the players must be able to differentiate between sounds and run towards them.
Our main objective for our Association is to promote physical activity and social interactions for people with Visual Impairments. Please come out and if you have any questions just contact me at: scmcnamara23@campabilitiesmichigan.org.
