The last CAS sessions of first semester

Today I have officially finished my CAS sessions for 2009 first semester.

In fashion design, I have started to improve in terms of my interaction with the younger girls. I have started to join a bit more in their conversations, and have even tried giving one short advice!

In basketball, I am now on the developmental team, which is the team for girls who didn't make the SAISA team and want to continue on to learn basic skills. For the moment, there are only 4 of us right now. This is a real concern, due to the fact that if we don't get 5 or more girls on the team then we may have to stop the developmental team. I have been learning some useful skills with Mr. Shipley and the assistant coach, Fillipo, who was previously on the SAISA boys basketball team. We have mostly been learning skills with Fillipo and recently we practiced a short game with him and three other boys. It wasn't really easy playing againts the boys. Not only simply because of physical strength, but I think it mostly has to do with the fact that they are the ones that have been playing for a longer period of times, so their skills are more advanced than ours. Overall, I seem to be doing well in terms of shooting, and today I learned a better more proper way of shooting and I learned more footwork as well. I think I need to work on more interaction with the other team members, as I feel I am not really showing enough of that.

In RCCI, last week we had a christmas party and we spent time in the canteen dancing. I didn't think the dancing space at the canteen was good enough though as everyone tended to be clumped together. I spent time with this girl that I just met and I taught her a few simple dance moves, and I even did one tango move with her!Haha!

My first practice

On Friday I had my very first basketball practice...and as a result my thighs still ache!LOL!All I can say is that I didn't really expect it to be this intense!!We started off by doing dribble exercises, which at one point we had to run and dribble the ball at the fastest speed possible, in which I was forced to confront the fact that I was indeed out of shape. We also did more movement based exercises in which were a bit complicated for me. For the first one, which involved three people passing to each other, after I passed the ball to one of the girls I was supposed to go behind the player. I thought I was going behind the other girl but Mr Tingley kept shouting at me to go behind and not to the side. I couldn't understand the difference. Then we were mostly divided into small teams. At first, I was made to watch how everything was played, since I missed all the other practices. Then I got the chance to join a game. I was a bit nervous at first, since I was no expert at this game and I have a tendency not to focus. Things didn't go that bad, and I coincidentally shooted a hoop. I believe that this was the first time that I actually got the opportunity to understand basketball a little more. But the only problem I face now so far is that I am not that good at being aggressive, which is an important skill you need to have when playing basketball. I generally have a tendency to be nice to people and I get afraid that if I get aggressive I will take things too far!!At the end of the day 14 girls that could possibly be part of the team were chosen. Those who were one of them had to come back on Sunday at 10 am while those who weren't were to come back on Tuesday after school and they were to be trained with Mr Shipley. The girls who didn't make the official team are known as the developmental team. The team of girls that get a chance to develop their skills and fill in for one of the official team members if one of them breaks a leg, gets into academic trouble, or gets sick. I, of course, wasn't one of the 14 girls that was on the list. So next practice for me will be on Tuesday. I guess I really need to work on being more aggressive, because at the moment I am a bit uncomfortable in being aggressive.

Recent update

I unfourtunatley could not make it to any of the basketball practices due to the fact that I was busy preparing for the secondary production that I had to do for drama class.The only chance I have now is for practice this Friday. But unfourtunatley, I really don't think I have a chance as the team members are already going to be chosen. I will try to make it anyway just in case something happens. If I can't make any basketball team then I will have no choice but to make something else as my Action activity.