At most schools, cheerleaders are charged solely with the responsibility of cheering for the football and basketball teams. This responsibility can be a hefty one that often includes practice, pep rallies, games, decorating time and many other time consuming activities. But consider this question…. What about the other sports? What message is being sent to the participants in other sports when they never have the benefit of cheerleaders gracing their sidelines? More and more it is becoming common practice to have the cheerleaders involved in a majority of the sporting activities at school and not just football and basketball.
There are several ways to accomplish achieving a more even distribution of time and attention. The first suggestion is to break your squad up into teams. If you have a twelve person squad, consider creating three teams of four people. Once you have individual assigned to each team you can distribute their time better. For instance each team may be responsible for cheering at one alternative activity each week. Also consider overlapping the responsibility. A rotational schedule where two of the three teams are required to be present will help in ensuring that your team won’t burn out.
Another consideration is to skip some away games for the football or basketball team and dedicate that time to other sporting teams. Your presence will certainly be missed, but the level of appreciation you will receive from the other teams benefitting from your presence is sure to make up for that. If you are considering diversifying your schedule to include cheering at more non-traditional events you may want to think about this at tryout time because having a larger squad makes it easier to distribute your team’s time accordingly. That is not to say a small team can’t spread their love and spirit across all teams.
Cheering at these alternative sporting events doesn’t require a total revamp of your cheer and chant book either. Use those general spirit chants and many times general offense and defense chants will work as well. It is nice to also have a few general sport specific chants under your belt too.
Below you will find a list to help get you started:
Soccer:
Our Goalie is Tough
Our Goalie is Mean
Our Goalie will save Everything!
Down, down, down the field
Up, Up, Up the Score
Down the Field to up the score!
Volleyball:
O-V-E-R, Over the Net
Serve It, Serve It
Go (Server’s Name)!
Bump, Hit
Set, Spike
That’s the way we like to fight!
General Chants:
S-C-O-R-E
Come on (mascot)
Let’s Score!
Let’s get physical
Get down, get rough, get mean
Let’s get physical and roll right over that team
Adding these other teams to your schedule may be a slight inconvenience, but the message that is being sent to the other teams is one that will surely be met with appreciation and gratitude.
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