Choose the target your partner calls
Hear a target before each gentle hand throw, confirm it and record the landing separately.
Change the information, not the speed
Use this activity after you can comfortably throw towards two familiar floor targets in a known order. Now your partner chooses the order. The aim is to respond to the target actually called, with time to ask again. There is no timer.
This is a hand-throwing activity with two people, not a racket stroke, reaction test or rating of badminton level. Begin after a warm-up suited to the activity. Return to a known order if the new task feels confusing.
Keep a familiar setup
Use one shuttle, the same hand and one starting line outside two large floor targets, A and B. Choose both rectangles from existing lines on your side of the net, with a clear gap between them. Agree the edges: the first landing on an edge counts as inside. Choose a starting place close enough for a gentle throw to either target.
Keep the area clear and dry, away from other players. The caller stays to the side, outside the throwing, landing and collecting areas, and never catches the shuttle. Keep any paper in the caller's hands, not on the floor.
Hold the shuttle by its base, hand comfortably beside your body, then gently move the hand forwards and upwards to release it. Stay in place until it lands. Wait until it has stopped, walk to collect it and return. Keep the hand, starting place, targets and throw unchanged across the rounds. Either person may stop the activity.
Try three rounds of four turns
For each turn, the thrower says they are ready. The caller names A or B. The thrower repeats the letter; clarify any difference before releasing. Do not change the requested target during that turn. In all three rounds, record the requested letter and the first letter repeated. If that repetition needed correcting, keep it in the record and add “clarified”; throw only after agreeing on the requested target.
- Known order: 4 turns. Agree A, A, B, B beforehand. Follow the ready/call/repeat/throw sequence each time. After landing, complete the record with the first landing: A, B, outside or not seen.
- Order chosen by the caller: 4 turns. After a break, the caller privately writes a new order containing 2 A and 2 B. Reveal only the current request, after “ready”. There is no need to answer quickly; repeat or clarify before throwing.
- Another chosen order: 4 turns. After another break, prepare a new private order with 2 A and 2 B. Keep the same procedure and setup. Do not add a second shuttle or call the next target while the current one is being collected.
Once a request has been made, its turn is used even if the throw misses or the landing is unclear. If you stop that turn without throwing, record “not thrown”; do not invent a landing or add a replacement turn. If the activity ends, mark the later turns “not started”. The maximum is 12 turns per person, not a requirement. Swap roles only after stopping and clearing the area.
Read the request and the result separately
A requested A with an agreed repeated A and a landing in B is a placement miss. If the request is A and the first repetition is B, clarify before release, keep A and B in the record and add “clarified”. The agreed target remains A; record the landing separately. Correcting that misunderstanding is part of the activity, not a fault to hide.
“Not seen”, “not thrown” and “not started” mean different things. Count them separately. The last two rounds use the same procedure but may have different orders, so a different total does not prove improvement. Keep this setup, return to a known order or ask your coach what to try separately next.
General practice advice: play within your limits and stop if something hurts.