Sensory football toolkit

Why do we need to deliver football differently for people with complex disabilities?

This resource focuses on addressing the issue of football not being delivered in an appropriate way for people with complex disabilities.

Although experiencing sport taking place can also be beneficial, those with complex disabilities can sometimes have sport “done to them”, rather than being actively involved in taking part. This means they may not engage meaningfully with the activity or experience the same benefits that their non-disabled peers experience through participating in sport, which include:

Improved physical and mental health.

• Maintaining a healthy weight.
• Making new friends.
• Gaining confidence.
• Improved ability to carry out everyday tasks.

We will demonstrate how you can make football more meaningful and engaging for people with complex disabilities, so they can experience the above benefits football can provide, as well as many more.

“At Sense, complex disabilities is defined as having two or more disabilities which mean you need a high level of support in your daily living. In particular, support to communicate, access information and move around.”

Who can benefit from sensory football?

This toolkit is aimed at those working with people with complex disabilities. For example:

The toolkit is designed to be completely accessible, so that those with little or no experience in delivering sport can lead the activities easily.

Outcomes

It is important that any sensory football programme delivered is outcome-led.

As well as being fun, there are a number of outcomes related to health, wellbeing and personal development which can be achieved by taking part in sensory football. It is important to identify which outcomes participants want to work towards, and then design activities which will help them achieve these outcomes.

There are some common outcomes which participants may experience by taking part in sensory football, such as:

• Independence – work towards doing activities more independently.
• Fun – this activity will provide enjoyment.
• Health & Fitness – improve your strength, flexibility, fitness levels or weight.
• Try Something New – experience something you haven’t tried before.
• Skill Development – this activity will improve your coordination and fine-motor skills.
• Social Skills – increase your interaction with others and develop friendships.
• Communication – develop your communication skills.
• Choice – develop the ability to exercise choice by deciding how you want to complete an exercise.
• Exploration – make use of your senses and show curiosity by exploring your environment.

These outcomes also have applications within everyday life. Participants may find that they can complete tasks such as getting dressed, holding shopping bags or communicating with their peers, with more confidence and independence.

“I kept the sessions very pupil-led so if they were really focused on a certain activity, I let that go on for longer than planned as sustained focus on an activity is difficult for some of the pupils.”

Community Foundation Sports Coach

“He looked much more comfortable with the celebrations for the goals today and had a go himself. He  can be sensitive to noise but seems to enjoy the goal celebration. He knows it’s a positive sound. He has become less sensitive to the noise.”

Residential care manager

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Section Two: Delivering Sensory football

How to plan your sessions

The activities within this toolkit are designed to be done anywhere, with whatever equipment you have available.

Depending on the time, space and equipment you have, there are two different ways in which you can deliver Sensory football:

In this guide you will find a session plan, which you can repeat each week, using the progressions provided to make the sessions more challenging if participants are becoming comfortable with a particular activity. Equally, examples are provided to make the activities slightly easier for those who may find them challenging.

Outcomes

Look out for our handy outcomes alongside each activity, which describe the key physical, mental and social benefits that each activity will work towards. These are the primary outcomes of the activity.

You will then find a more detailed explanation of these outcomes in this guide. Remember, this is not an exhaustive list.

There are many different benefits to taking part in sport & physical activity, and each activity will work towards multiple outcomes. We have simply selected one or two of the most relevant outcomes for each activity.

Be creative, adaptable and responsive

The key to a successful session is understanding the needs of the participants you are working with, and adapting your session so that they can have the best experience possible. By tweaking the activities provided to suit your participants, or using them as a basis to create your own activities, you will ensure each participant can engage with the session in a meaningful way.

“In order to focus on certain elements in insolation, I had to pack away the balls to take away any distractions, and then get them back out later in the lesson. This helped participants get the full experience of all  the elements, instead of just sticking to their favourite part.”

Teacher- SEN School

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Warm Up

Aims and outcomes

Aims

• Getting used to the surroundings.
• Getting used to working together as a group.
• Pulse- raising.

Preparing for the activities to come.

• Outcomes
• Independence
• Exploration
• Skill development

Mapping the space

Move around the space, feeling the outline or the perimeter of the space. This could include the walls, flooring, or cones.

Make it easier

• Provide more support, guidance and direction to the participant when moving around and exploring the space.

Make it harder

• Encourage the participant to explore the environment more independently.

Mapping the Equipment

Pick up pieces of equipment and explore their shape, size and texture

Make it easier

• Suggest pieces of equipment for the participant to explore, and support them to feel and squeeze each item.
• Spend longer exploring one piece of equipment in more detail.

Make it harder

• Try exploring new, different pieces of equipment.
• Encourage the participant to interact with a number of different balls in a specific amount of time. Can the participant notice how they differ in shape, size, weight and texture?

Encouraging Movement and Interaction

Make it easier

• Support staff actively approach and make contact with participants.

Make it harder

• Encourage participants to navigate the space and initiate high fives more independently.
• High five as many people as possible in an allotted time, for example five people in one minute.
• Rather than high fiving, connect with others using a different part of the body (e.g. foot to foot or shoulder to shoulder).
• Connect everyone in the group to form a big chain, with participants taking it in turns to move along the chain, feeling the connections between each person.
• Reach up high or crouch down low to make connections.

Kick off

Aims and outcomes

Aims

• To signal the start of the sensory football session.
• To prepare the participants mentally for the activity they are about to do.

Outcomes

• Communication

Create your kick off

Create something which represents the start of the football session.

This could be a sound, colour, texture, movement or gesture, which participants understand to mean “we are ready to begin”. Come up with something which is meaningful for everyone in the group. 

• A BSL sign for “go”
• A thumbs up
• A green cone

Top tips

• Whatever you choose, it’s important that it holds meaning and is understood by the participants.
• This should be repeated at the same point every week, in order to help participants recall what activity they are about to take part in, and prepare them for this activity.

Tackling

Aims and outcomes

Aims

• Making physical contact with others.
• Using body strength.
• Being competitive with an opponent.

Outcomes

• Health & Fitness
•  Choice
• Exploration

Resistance bands

1. Face opposite one another, each holding onto the same resistance band.
2. At the same time, each use your arm strength to pull the resistance band away from one another, stretching the band and creating tension.
3. Try holding this for 3 seconds and repeat 10 times. As the participant improves, increase the hold to 5 or 10 seconds.

Make it easier

• Loop the resistance band around a participant’s hand and gently pull to create force on the band.
• Stretch the band with both hands and encourage the participant to feel the stretched band so they can experience the sensation of the tension being created.
• Complete the activity sitting down.

Make it harder

• Use thicker or heavier bands.
• Pull the band from below, up high, or from the side, to develop strength in a range of muscles.

Top tips

If you haven’t got a resistance band, you could use a soft or stretchy item such as a tea towel. Be careful of using anything which may snap and cause pain, could wrap around a hand too tightly or ingest, such as a small elastic band.

Passing

Aims and outcomes

Aims

• Possessing and releasing.
• Transferring an object to someone else.
• Receiving an object from someone else.

Outcomes

• Try something new
• Communication
• Exploration

Try completing each of the following 10 times:

Grip and release

• Select a ball or object and focus on holding and squeezing it, before letting go of it.

Transfer

• Face your partner, a metre or so apart, sitting down or standing up.
• Roll, bounce or throw the ball to your partner.

Receive

• Now have your partner roll, bounce or throw the ball to you.
• Focus on anticipating where the ball is coming from, and bringing it under control and into your possession.

Make it easier

• Face one another, both holding onto the ball at the same time. Push and pull the ball back and forth between one another, whilst still holding onto it.

Make it harder

• Increase the amount of participants to 3, 4, 5 or more, forming a circle, meaning each participant has to make a choice about where to release the ball, and understand that it may be coming towards them from a range of different angles.

Scoring

Aims and outcomes

Aims

• Celebrating acheivements
• Sharing in them with others, creating togetherness

Outcomes

• Independence
• Fun
• Skill development

Goal scoring

1. Set up two cones (or chairs, or another suitable pair of objects) as shown in the image below.
2. Starting a couple of metres away, kick, roll, throw, bounce or carry the ball in between the two cones.
3. Once the goal is scored, everyone within the session (not just the goal scorer) collects a colourful ribbon or flag, and waves it around, or claps their hands, cheering and making and much noise as possible to celebrate the goal!
4. Each participant takes it in turns to score a goal, followed by a group celebration. Repeat 3 times each.

Top tips

• Reinforce the achievement of scoring a goal by repeating the celebration process each time a goal is scored.
• Once confident with one method of scoring a goal, try out different ways of moving the ball through the goal (for example rolling, kicking, or running with the ball).

Make it easier

• Spend some time mapping out the goal area in a tactile way, to understand it’s size and distance.
• Run, walk, wheel, crawl or shuffle through the goal, holding onto the ball.
• Make the goal bigger, or start closer to the goal.

Make it harder

• Make the goal smaller, or start further away.

Final whistle

Aims and outcomes

Aims

• To signal the end of the sensory football session.

Outcome

• Communication.

Create your final whistle

Create something which represents the end of the football session. This could be a sound, colour, texture, movement or gesture, which participants understand to mean “we have now finished”. Come up with something which is meaningful for everyone in the group:

• A BSL sign for “finished”.
• A round of applause.
• A red cone.

Top tips

• Whatever you choose it’s important that it holds meaning and is understood by the participants.
• This should be repeated at the same point every week, in order to help participants understand that they have now come to the end of the sensory football session.

Key points to consider

1: Support staff will know the participants best, and will be working with them closely throughout the session.

Therefore, try to empower them to adapt the activities to support or develop the participants as they see fit. For this, they may need to use their initiative and be creative- encourage this!

2: Don’t worry if things take longer than expected to deliver, or it takes participants longer than expected to move through the activities.

Focus on getting good quality engagement and outcomes from the session, even if this means moving through the activities more slowly, or focusing only on one part of the session.

3: Due to the complex disabilities of the participants involved, developments may not be apparent straight away.

Try to focus on the outcomes listed earlier in this resource, not just on participants’ “football skills”. For example, some people find being in a group with others challenging.

If this was to improve over a number of sessions, this is a huge achievement that should be acknowledged.

4: After a period of time, participants may begin to recognise and complete tasks more independently.

“She has become more engaged with staff and more interested in interacting with them.”

FA Level 2 Football Coach

5: Behaviour change may be very subtle, so work with staff, carers or family members who know the participant well to identify small, positive changes.

6: A weekly observation of a participant may be influenced by who is making the observation.

Having the person working with and evaluating a participant’s progress each week helps provide consistency and a more reliable comparison.

7: Repeating the same activities over a number of weeks, with progression where possible, is key to the learning process for many individuals with complex disabilities.

Try to maintain a routine, with weekly sessions at the same time and place if possible, to enhance the learning process.

“The pupils are understanding the concept of the goal section much more and will sit on the bench, waiting their turn, and know what to do with the ribbons.”

Teacher – SEN School

8: Sensory football activities work best when there is adequate support for everyone in the group, to engage with and explore the activities.

9: There are many factors outside of your control which may impact the delivery of a sensory football session, such as unforeseen disruptions or challenging behaviour.

Remember it is ok to repeat activities, scale them back or move through them slowly if required.

“I decided to go to the classroom before each session to explain to the pupils and staff what we were doing in the session, then walk to the hall with the class and let them explore as soon as they went in. This seemed to improve behaviour, as the pupils didn’t have to come into the hall and sit down to wait for instructions, they could be active straight away.”

Teacher – SEN School

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Suggested equipment list

Sensory football sessions are designed to be delivered with minimal equipment, using whatever you have available. Think about making them sensory by using different textures, sizes and colours.

To get the most out of the sessions, you may wish to purchase the following:

• Resistance bands
• Ribbons
• Balls
• Cones

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Practical delivery template

Although Sensory football is designed to be easy to pick up anywhere at any time, you may wish to plan your sessions to ensure the activities you deliver are supporting participants to meet their desired outcomes.

Use the below planning template as a guide, or come up with your own. It is important to consider outcomes, and then use creativity to come up with activities which will help participants to achieve these.