Mary Spencer stands at the end of a dark tunnel. She hears the roar of the crowd. She closes her eyes. Her fingers tingle inside her boxing gloves.
It is the London 2012 Olympic Games. Today is the first day of the women’s Olympic boxing competition. It is also the first time women have been allowed to box in the Olympic Games.
It has taken a long time for women’s boxing to win respect. It has also taken Mary a long time.
Mary is from the Cape Croker First Nations Reserve and grew up in Windsor, Ont.
Her family didn’t have a lot of money. She got in trouble at school. She even failed gym class.
But her life changed the first time she stepped into a boxing ring.
“I saw what I could do,” says Mary. “I won my first bout. I loved boxing.”
Mary knows that she is doing more than just boxing today. She is showing the kids back home what they can do.
“I do a lot of work with kids,” she says. “I need to win for myself and for them. I want them to know that they can do something special too if they work hard.”
Mary is one of the best boxers in the world. In fact, Mary has been at the top of her sport for years. She has won three world titles and more than 100 bouts.
During all that time, boxing was the only sport in the Olympic Games that was only for men.
“I had hoped they would let women box at the 2008 Olympic Games,” said Mary. “They didn’t. That was very hard to take. I just had to keep hoping for 2012.”
Some sports fans still don’t take Mary’s sport seriously. Maybe they don’t like the idea of women fighting with their fists.
“It was hard to gain respect when women’s boxing wasn’t an Olympic sport,” she says. “A lot of people still don’t know how tough it is.”
That finally changed two years ago, when the International Olympic Committee announced that women could box at the London 2012 Olympic Games.
But there would only be three weight classes for women. The men have ten.
They did not add Mary’s weight category. She had to move up a level and box heavier athletes, although Mary has stayed positive. She keeps winning.
Now she is at the Olympic Games.
She wants to win. But she also knows she needs to respect her opponents.
Boxing is tough and dangerous. Competitors tap gloves at the start of each bout. Mary says boxers often tap gloves during the bout as well, “to say good job”.
“Boxers respect each other,” she says. “We all know that it takes a lot of courage to get in the ring. You see the respect we have for each other after a competition. I have never seen boxers fight outside of the ring.”
The cheering gets louder. Mary makes her way into the ring. She sees her opponent. Now she has to get ready to compete at the highest level.
Millions of people will be watching here and on TV. Mary knows she’s ready. She knows that after years of waiting and fighting for respect, it is about to arrive … win or lose.
Connecting: Respect Placemats
Teacher explains that respect is the act of honouring other people (accepting others for who they are), and treating them with dignity (being nice to others, doing things without being asked, etc). Self-respect is accepting yourself for who you are and being proud of who you are.
Move students into six small working groups. Write one of the following questions on six large sheets of papers (flip chart/ Bristol boards):
- What does respect look like?
- What does respecting others sound like (how do you see and act around them)?
- What does it feel like when you are being respected (how are you treated and how do others act around you)?
- What does it feel like when you are respecting someone else?
- What does respecting me look like?
- What does respecting my world look like?
- Students have three minutes with their group to write or sketch key ideas for each question.
- On the teacher’s signal, pass all the sheets clockwise so that each group can respond to a new question. Continue this until all groups have had a chance to work on each ‘placemat’.
- Note: A carousel activity, where the students move to a posted sheet on the wall, encourages more physical activity. Students are timed to quickly walk to the next ‘placemat’.
- With their final ‘placemat’, the group chooses one idea and reads the question and response to the rest of the class.
Note: A carousel activity, where the students move to a posted sheet on the wall, encourages more physical activity. Students are timed to quickly walk to the next ‘placemat’.
Processing: Walking a Mile in Someone Else’s Shoes
- Re-read the story aloud together, or ask the students to read it silently on their own.
- As the class to imagine that we are asking the questions from the Connecting section to Mary Spencer (previous activity). Students brainstorm how Mary would answer the questions, using ideas from the story. Encourage the students to look closely at Mary’s quotes.
Transforming: A Flip-Flap Book
Students think about how they might be respectful to others, themselves, and their world. They make a Flip-flap book (see attached template). Beneath each flap, students can draw or write how they will practice respect in the given area.