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UNC professor writes book on how to use traversing walls
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University of Northern Colorado professor Jim Stiehl, right, watches as senior student Veronica Garcia traverses the Vertical Playpen Wednesday at the UNC ropes course in Greeley. Stiehl wrote a book on traversing walls.
BRET HARTMAN / bhartman@greeleytribune.com
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Dan England, (Bio) dengland@greeleytribune.com
May 2, 2008
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When he got ready to research his next book, Jim Stiehl turned to the experts.
Namely, a lot of kids in Greeley's elementary and middle schools.
The book, "Traversing Walls," presents teachers with games and activities to do on a traversing rock wall, so it was only appropriate he reached out to students. Traversing walls, after all, are sweeping the nation and are in the gymnasiums of many schools, including quite a few in Greeley.
"I just asked them what they would change," said Stiehl, a longtime professor of sports and exercise science at the University of Northern Colorado, "and they came up with all kinds of stuff."
Stiehl wrote the book to give physical education teachers ways to use the walls. Once they're installed, teachers generally use them a while, the kids have fun, and then they just sit there. Stiehl's book, written with a graduate student, Dan Chase, offers 68 games, ideas and activities on ways to use those walls.
Stiehl, of course, has a vested interest in seeing climbing be a part of any gym class. That's what he loves to do. He rock climbs, is a mountaineer and is one of UNC's longtime ropes course instructors.
So he had plenty of motivation to finish the book. Traverse wall climbing is a great way to get students interested in the sport because they can learn how to climb without much of a risk of hurting themselves. They're only a couple of feet off the ground.
Plus, it's easy to change around the routes.
"All you really need," Stiehl said, "is some masking tape and a marker."
Even so, it's always difficult for physical education teachers to find games to do with them, and that's one reason why Stiehl wrote the book. To find ideas, not only did he talk to students, he went back to his own childhood.
"You'd be amazed at how many of these ideas came from dusty old board games," Stiehl said. "Stuff like Sorry and others."
Another reason for the book, however, was a common complaint he heard from his former students. They always felt isolated from the other teachers.
"The P.E. teachers have the biggest classroom in the school," Stiehl said, "but they rarely felt any real connection to the other academics. They tend to be by themselves. It's understandable. It's hard for a classroom teacher to envision what's going on in a gym and how it can be used."
Many activities in the book encourage other teachers to use the wall, like, say, climbing a route from Florida to Kansas, and it also encourages gym teachers to offer suggestions on how to use the wall, as well. Connections are made that way, just like climbing a route, from point A to point B.
If they are used that way, there's no doubt in Stiehl's mind that interest in climbing will grow.
"Many of the kids," he said, "said they wanted to keep climbing outdoors."
For more information
If you're interested in Jim Stiehl's book, "Traversing Walls," written with Dan Chase, you can go to www.humankinetics.com.
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