Sport in School
No sports days, cricket matches, egg and spoon races or parent
and child relays. We have missed a whole summer of sport in
schools, professionally, socially and watched endless reruns of the
Premier League, Champions League and the Gallagher
Premiership. We have managed and now have a huge list of sports
fixtures compressed into a few weeks. My concern is about school
sports and below I will tell you why.
Over the last 20 years or so sport in schools has been ‘squeezed’.
Time on the curriculum has been cut, playing fields sold for
development. We have seen an increase in health and safety
regulations which put teachers off exposing themselves to risk. The
days of filling the minibus with the rugby team and driving them to
fixtures are gone unless you are keen on 4 hours of form filling first.
I remember well with fondness opening the changing room on a
Saturday morning for a school footy match. No school alarms then!.
We finished around 12 and then off I went to play rugby in the
afternoon. As the years went by many of the lads came with me and
got into Rugby. Those kids you bonded with you on the sports field
never caused you problem in the classroom. You had a special
relationship. Now we have fewer sports teachers. Primary schools
share a ‘facilitator’!. And now.. Covid!
We are now in a situation in which there is a possibility that some of
our schoolchildren will have no competitive sports for more than a
year. Unlike elite sportspeople who maintain a training regime
throughout the absence of formal play. How many of our children
will have the self discipline to maintain a fitness regime to replace
what schools offer? Not many I suspect. So to alleviate this problem
where should we turn? Surely the greatest sports achievers per
capita in the world…Australia and New Zealand. Guess what?
Online sports lessons and workouts with rewards for the kids! You
can log on from remote rural communities and use what you have in
the area to work out your programme. There are tree climbing
programmes, hill running swimming in local lakes etc etc. That
might not be possible here. But we have other options. Lots of
parks and open spaces many with exercise equipment or simply
open spaces to work out in. In the Southern hemisphere they record
their efforts and earn points towards various rewards. Surely there is a gap in the market for someone here? I realise lots of
professional sports clubs are doing so well to engage kids.
Organisations such as the YMCA are still doing great work
providing school and holiday clubs. But, hey..someone out
there..what about an imaginative winter fitness programme for our
kids?
I know one person who needs it..me!