Students of the International Sport Business Management programme and exchange student from France, organized a sport event for children on 25th April 2024 in Ounashalli. The event was held as part of the Global Sport Environments course, in collaboration with teacher Anzelika Krastina and the elementary school of Ounasrinne.

Joyful laughter echoes throughout Ounashalli as the primary school students of Ounasrinne play American football and more familiar “European” version of the football together with Lapland University of Applied Sciences students. The children of Ounasrinne School also had the opportunity to see what kind of equipment is used in American football.

“Good catch,” you hear from a Lapland UAS student, when a primary school-aged child grabs hold of the American football. A smile spreads across the child’s face. Time has flown quickly at Ounashalli as our sport event is coming to an end. Children have had the chance to try American football and the more familiar soccer. Finally, we got to play the legendary dodgeball with the kids as well. The children are happy, with healthy redness on their faces. That’s why we wanted to organize the event specifically for children. (Text continues after the pictures) 

The group picture of the organisersSports equipment on the lawn

From the beginning, we, the students had a clear vision of the type of sports event we wanted to organize. We stuck to our original plan and aimed to host a fun sport event especially for primary school-aged children. We presented two ways of playing football. American football was surely entirely new to many, while soccer that we played on the other side of the field was more familiar. We wanted to give the children the opportunity to explore new and somewhat familiar sports through play and games. Ending with a game of dodgeball was a fun way to finish the day, as we got all the students from Ounasrinne school to join.

In addition to sports, the children had the opportunity to hear English, and, if they were brave enough, to speak it as well. We also considered this aspect particularly important, as we are an international program and aim to encourage children and young people to hear English in a school environment. It was nice to hear the children speaking English and understanding the instructions in both languages.

This was also the first event altogether that we organized as a class, and it was a great opportunity for all of us who participated in the course to learn more about organizing sports events. The event was planned, brainstormed, and ideated together, which made it meaningful also for all the students participating in the course. In addition to sports, we wanted to emphasize our internationality, so it was nice to have an exchange student involved in organizing the event.

A big thank you goes to Ounasrinne school and the children who made the event possible. We would also like to say big thank you to the students who were involved in organizing the event alongside teacher Anzelika Krastina. The event was great learning experience, but above all, a great way to end this academic year with almost our entire class participating.

Written by Vili Varjus, International Sport Business Management student
Photo credit: Vili Varjus