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why host a school floorball program?
School floorball is a FREE school-based program hosted by and run in conjunction with local elementary schools. HEO instructors and staff introduce elementary school students to the game of hockey using floorball. HEO will provide all the equipment needed for a floorball program. The school must provide a gym space and eye protection for the students.
Floorball is both an ideal introduction to hockey for new players and an effective off-ice skill development tool for current players. The lightweight equipment and lack of stick and body contact decreases the large range of skills between new- to-hockey and experienced players, ensuring that all players have the opportunity to participate, are engaged and can benefit from the game.
The lightweight equipment will help new- to-hockey players to improve their stickhandling, passing and shooting skills off the ice. It will also enhance the skill development of experienced players by allowing them to develop better stickhandling abilities, quickness and hand-eye coordination, which are directly transferred back to the ice. Floorball is a high-intensity sport where players must quickly change directions, providing all participants with hockey-specific off-ice conditioning.
If you are interested in running a floorball program in your school, please contact Jeff Robert jrobert@hockeyeasternontario.ca
What is floorball?
Floorball is a fun, safe and fast-paced form of floor hockey developed in the 1970s in Europe. The game is played indoors on a gym floor with specialized lightweight sticks and rules that make game play much safer than traditional floor hockey. The game of floorball is used in a variety of Hockey Canada development programs as an off-ice training tool, and it is ideal for schools as a safe, inclusive introduction to hockey. Floorball is played in more than 50 countries around the world and is governed by the International Floorball Federation, an organization with full recognition from the International Olympic Committee.
Floorball promotes end-to-end plays with quick transitions and fluid game play. The rules stress the importance of safety and sportsmanship and are designed to limit the chance of injury without decreasing the speed or skill of the game. The rules, in addition to the lightweight equipment, ensure that floorball is a welcoming and engaging sport for players of all hockey experience levels.
Floorball Rules
• Stick must remain below the waist.
• Ball is played below knee level at all times.
• No body contact, no blocking/screening of opposing players.
• Stick-on-body contact or stick-on-stick contact is not permitted.
• No hitting, lifting or pinning of the opponent’s stick.
• Free hits similar to a free kick in soccer are given for minor rule infractions.
• No offside or icing .
• Game is played with five players and one goaltender per team on the court at a time.
Floorball Equipment
- Floorball sticks are engineered for superior stickhandling, ball control and shooting. They are lightweight, inexpensive, durable and non-marking.
- A floorball stick should reach about two cm above the belly button of the player.
- Floorball goaltenders do not use a stick, but instead wear gloves to catch or grab, and then roll the ball.
- The official ball is 72 mm in diameter, weighs 23 g and is made of hard plastic with 26 evenly distributed holes, similar to a wiffle ball.
- A floorball net is 160 cm wide by 115 cm high, similar to the size of a hockey net.
- Floorball players do not wear any protective equipment, except for protective eyewear – only a t-shirt, shorts and athletic shoes are required.