Taylor Ray gives some pro-tips on getting your school spirit pumping for Friday Night Lights! Get hyped now so homecoming will be a breeze!
1. GET CREATIVE!
The moment you get the football schedule, get with your squad to paint large signs and make locker posters for each game. Hang your masterpieces in the halls of the school and on the fence around the football field to show school pride. This is also a great way to keep everyone in the know of who your team is playing and where the game is that week.
Pro tip: Hold a painting party with your squad to paint all the signs you will need for the season so that you aren’t rushing to paint something every week.
2. TRADITIONS
As a cheerleader at your school, it is YOUR responsibility to make all the traditions exciting! Talk with your squad to make sure you have special traditions that you always do for kick off, touchdowns, and wins. Create a buzz among the student body by asking their input on their favorite traditions, find out what they love and make sure you always incorporate that tradition! Talk with your head football coach or athletic director and work with your band director to make sure everyone is working towards the same goal and the traditions are consistent. They would LOVE to help promote school spirit with help from the cheer team!
3. INVOLVEMENT
Pep rallies are a fun way to drive school spirit by involving everyone at your school. Ask someone with a big personality to be the emcee to keep the pace going at every pep rally; this could be your principal, athletic director, a teacher, or a coach! Work with your music department to make sure music is always ready to be played during any transitional times. Create a script that everyone involved can refer to and keep the flow of the pep rally going. Crowd dances/line dances are a great excitement builder and an easy way to involve everyone because they can participate from their seat. Class yells are another fun way to involve the student body, let the loudest class win the spirit flag or spirit stick that week! ALWAYS involve dance team, drum line, and any other spirit group your school may have at the pep rally.
Pro tip: Do not allow any “down time” or “quiet time” during a pep rally.
4. FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS
Be prepared by planning what cheers and sidelines to do during timeouts, touchdowns, kick off, defense and offense. ALWAYS use signs, megaphones, and poms. Use simply worded crowd-leading style cheers so that the crowd can know what to yell back when you want them to! Work with your band on signals so that you know when they are about to play a song. Dance, stunt, yell or jump during band songs; never just stand around and clap your hands and ignore the band.
Your student section at games is SO important, talk with your friends and ask them to get extra rowdy when the cheerleaders are doing cheers. The student section is your ultimate bestie to help get the rest of the crowd to yell!
