Clare Blackmore a former School Sport Magazine Teacher of the Year and Sports Co-Ordinator at St Lawrence’s Primary School in Somerset
25.11.09
Basil Catkinson is a pupil who attends St.Lawrence's Primary School, Westbury-sub-Mendip in rural Somerset. Basil has many gifts, not all of them academic.
He is extremely handsome, moderately intelligent, very superior and is a valued member of the school community.
Basil has a singular approach to education and the national curriculum, most of it viewed from the classroom floor.
Despite the schools efforts to interest Basil in formal learning it has been found that he is not really bothered about literacy and numeracy but he does enjoy science especially topic work on Minibeasts and Garden Birds and he loves the art of Seurcat.
Basil's favourite book is To Kill A Mockingbird, he likes drama, particularly plays like The Mousetrap, and is happiest at school when chilling with his fellow pupils at lunchtime, especially if they have tuna for lunch.
Basil has recently taken his CATS Tests (at the sixth attempt) and it is hoped that he may actually have got at least one question correct this time.
Basil also gets an annual report each summer to outline to his parents Max and Jo Catkinson progress, if any, that he has made during the academic year.
As a very individual pupil Basil already has his own page entitled Basil's Antics, in the school newspaper.
Basil is delighted that his antics are featured in this book to raise funds for his school and also his favourite charity Water Aid.
Water Aid is an international charity whose mission is to enable the world’s poorest people to gain access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene education.
What you may say has this got to do with sport?
Falling numbers, reduced budget and no money for PE so what do you do, write a book.
Historically here the PE budget for the year has been an average £150 with the rest of the excess funding going to wages, school running costs and core curriculum.
School numbers have fallen from an average of 80 plus to 55 representing an enormous drop in budget.
In the village where there used to be 10 working farms and families there is now one.
Three factories in the nearby town which were huge employers have closed and the houses in the village are far too expensive for a young family to buy.
The largest employer in the area now is the local secondary school.
PE has always been a vital part of this school totally inclusive and fun. The small annual funding has enabled me to tick over replacing footballs, netballs, buying new equipment.
Now there is none. This year the governors have decided to focus funding on classroom essentials and the core curriculum.
Teaching football, netball, rugby, basketball skills amongst other sports is frustrating and below standard when you have a bag full of knackered balls which don’t inflate and only enough in number for one between two or three.
Applying for funding is a pain, you fill in forms, you wait, and you get turned down.
As a rural school we have no ethnic or cultural diversity so in many cases do not qualify for funding. We cannot match fund.
So….. as we have the wonderful bonus of a daft cat who visits us daily I put pen to paper, spoke to some nice people at Bristol Water, spent the summer slaving over a hot computer and HEY PRESTO……….. Basil’s School Antics was born.
It contains photographs of Basil up to various naughty things in the classroom with copies of his annual report and so far is selling well.
Half the profits are going to the school, half to Water Aid.
So if you read this blog, copies of the book are available at £4.99 (including p and p). Cheques are payable to Bristol Water PLC.
It is a purrrrrrfect present for cat lovers.
Contact me on cblackmore@educ.somerset.gov.uk
Feedback on the book has been extremely positive and if I may gloat in the cause of sport:
“A brilliant concept extremely funny and well executed”
26.10.09
Somerset is an idyllic place to live - moors and levels, tors and mist, Arthur and Camelot.
However its ruralness gives small village schools an inherent problem in times of recession, credit crunch and a static housing market.
This has a knock on effect for village schools as families cannot afford the house prices and there is no work to draw them to a rural location.
Therefore school numbers fall quite dramatically, in our case from 83 to 57.
The lack of numbers also effects sports performance in competitions and matches against other schools.
We can no longer field a team comprising children from the top two age groups in years 5 and 6, having to often go down to year 3 to make up the numbers.
As a consequence we have started the local football and netball leagues but languish in bottom place as the bigger primary schools overwhelm us physically and with the ability to field single year group teams.
However one major advantage of having smaller numbers is that the younger children can work with the older children.
To still give all children a positive sporting experience, we are having skills sessions in after school clubs and special afternoons with specialist coaches where having years 3, 4, 5 and 6 together is not a numeric problem,
It actually has enormous benefits as the children work together and the younger children love being involved with the cool year 6s.
Recently we had an afternoon of rugby skills with two coaches from our local club and a coach from a rugby academy.
Two years ago, year 3 would not have been included as there would have been too many children. This time year 3 came too and had a wonderful time.
You could see by the end of the afternoon that their confidence had grown, not only in a skills and sporting sense, but also in their interaction with the older children and their belief in their own ability.
We have also had a golf session with the professional from the local club where the mix worked really well and are planning some football afternoons with the county FA.
So smaller pupil numbers have benefits and you have to take all the positives you can as small numbers means a radically reduced school budget and you know which subject department gets cut first...but don’t get me started on that one!
21.7.09
We made it. A three and a half hour journey and we arrived in Roehampton at The National Tennis Centre.
Wow, what an amazing facility and practically empty except for the Murray brothers, Alex Bogdanovitch and Jamie Delgado.
I think the best way to convey the impression it had on my fifteen year 6 pupils is from excerpts from their thank you letters after a wonderful and eye opening day.
“I loved the day out it at the National Tennis Centre. It's probably one of the highlights of my primary school career. When the day came to an end we all wanted to stay, especially me. It was a once in a lifetime chance.”
“It was so cool to be able to play on your outdoor court. How many other schools in England get to do that? It was a really nice court, much nicer than our own worn down playground. The visit has really inspired me and now I am into tennis than ever before.”
“I have never been the biggest tennis fan because it has never suited me. However now I have played on a real tennis court I felt the joy surge through me at every swing of the racket. But I still don't feel the need to grunt every time.”
“Thank you for letting us come to the National Tennis Centre. My favourite time was when we saw Andy Murray (even though he used some bad language)”
“The main building with all the courts in was exquisitely built. If you put all the indoor courts together it is bigger than our whole school. I enjoyed playing on those awesome courts I will remember that for the rest of my life.”
“When we first saw just the front entrance our jaws flew open. I think the people that work there are the luckiest in the world. It was an outstanding day.”
“Thank you for a wonderful day. It has motivated me to work harder on my tennis. It was so cool playing on your courts much better than the slopey playground we have and I could actually hit the ball better.”
“It was really good playing on real courts with proper nets. The indoor courts were wicked and you could feel the spring. When we watched Andy Murray and his coach it was mesmerising. They were getting the ball and doing so on their tiptoes.”
“To be honest I wasn't that interested in tennis when I arrived but you have inspired me to play more tennis and now I would like to be a professional when I grow up.”
“My favourite part of the visit was playing on the courts. It was so much better than playing tennis across the tape tied between two trees on our playground. I think it has improved my tennis a lot and it has also made me enjoy tennis a lot more. It was an unforgettable day and I wish I could come again.”
“On the way up in the minibus we were really excited and all wondering what it would be like. The journey was painstakingly long but it was worth it, really worth it.”
“Thank you for letting us use your fantastic courts. You are some of the nicest people in the world. I just wish I could play at the Tennis Centre all the time.”
2.7.09
We are off to the National Tennis Development Centre at Roehampton in London for a day trip.
I am taking my year 6s for a tortuous journey up the motorway in a borrowed mini bus as I want to see this centre of excellence and let my children see the fantastic facilities.
As the next generation of tennis players that the LTA are so keen to produce, I was sick of hearing on the radio that schools, especially state schools, don’t give their pupils the chance to play tennis and that millions of pounds have gone into grassroots funding.
When I joined the British Schools Tennis Association, the questionnaire accompanying the application form asked how many courts the school had, indoor, outdoor, roofed and heated.
The real world is usually a playground with a couple of zig nets and a roll of black and yellow warning tape bought from Screwfix which I tie to the school fence and a couple of trees to approximate a net.
Try to get an LTA coach into a small rural primary school. Around here, great coaches that they are and they have to make a living, they are mostly or wholly at Millfield and the other private schools in the area.
So we go it alone but direct those who parents are willing or can afford it to the local tennis club who actually work very hard to encourage children through their doors.
So……when the great British summer debate started on various radio discussions about “Where will the next Andy Murray come from”, I as usual, got flipping annoyed.
I heard someone form the National Tennis Development Centre talking about their amazing facilities and thought that if they are supposed to be looking for the next AM, they sure ain’t looking in my school so I will take my school to them.
They didn’t quite know how to take my request and I was told it was not really the done thing to have children coming to have look round but I persisted and persisted and persisted and we go next Friday, Somerset to SW15 leaving school at 7am.
We have to take our own rackets, and were asked if the children would be lunching in the NTDC restaurant. We are not allowed on the indoor courts but may have some time on an outdoor court.
The parents of the 15 children I am taking have bought them all a nice embroidered white polo shirt so we will look the part.
I know my children will behave impeccably but THE REAL WORLD OF SCHOOL tennis is about to take Roehampton by storm and I will write about our experience on our return.
26.6.09
The closing date for collecting Tesco Vouchers has passed and the great count up begins.
Usually I get hyper-excited anticipating all the goodies I can get with the sports specific vouchers, all mine, all for PE, all for the health, fitness and well being of my charges.
Not this year.
Firstly Tesco in their wisdom (who did they consult on this decision, any PE Teachers?) have merged the sport and computer vouchers.
(We do not have a Sainsburys within a 20 mile radius so cannot take advantage of their voucher scheme)
Secondly, due to the national problem of falling roles in primary schools, especially those in rural areas as the credit crunch bites, the budget in our school is barely enough to cover running expenses so ALL the Tesco vouchers this year are to go to cover items needed for the core curriculum , not PE.
I can understand the reasoning behind the decision but again PE loses out when budgets fall and costs rise and schools are financially pared to the bone.
The amount allocated in the budget to PE equipment this year is £0.00. Think on ye in the private sector.
The Blackmore begging bowl is out again.
PLEASE PLEASE TESCO RECONSIDER YOUR DECISION
17.6.09
Follow up poem to “In Praise of Tesco”
Oh Tesco, what have you done
Merging the computer and sports tokens into one.
Gone is the PE independence
Once ICT has had a look
And ordered the book
PE will be getting the remnants.
No longer that September feeling
Of practically hitting the ceiling
With boxes galore
All over the floor
And a PE teacher practically reeling.
There now has to be a division
For ICT and PE provision
ICT think they’re the best
PE get the rest
We have to reach a decision.
Please rethink for 2010
Give sport its independence again
School budgets are falling
A fact that’s appalling
And PE gets left out in the rain
24.4.09
Well sweet FA, the Sweet FA have made us a Football Focus School. How wonderful is that? But what does it mean? Well sweet FA really..
So, the history. Why were we selected to be a Football Focus School?
1.Principally because as a school we have a very good name for providing an inclusive opportunity for all the children to learn football skills and play football in curriculum and extra curricular time and in a competitive form from the ages of four to eleven.
2. Because even though we are a small rural 80 pupil school we have three football teams, an U11s, an U9 and a girls team.
3. We were very proud of being the smallest and the first primary school to become, by hard work and commitment, a Charter Standard School before the scheme was abandoned.
4. So everything was historically in place for us to be nominated and awarded the wonderful title of Football Focus School, with very little actual input from the FA beyond the odd certificate which reinforced the work we did.
To be a Football Focus School we had to put together, with the local FA, a development plan.
Boxes ticked for Soho Square, all produced on a lovely piece of paper, a letter to us from Soho Square congratulating us on being chosen as one of the elite.
Wonderful, so we continue what we had already been doing - matches, after school club, weekly football practices, skills during PE, access to footballs during playtimes and wait for the focus from the FA to kick in (no pun intended).
We wait. Yet nothing from the FA. Diddly squat.
Then it clicks. All the highlighted areas in the Action Plan, things like, establish a formal link with the local club, (previously a few phone calls between school, parents and coaches from the local club sorted that), establish a dedicated girls coaching session, (previously we all played together, girls and boys) are meant for us to do, nothing to do with the FA at all.
Then an email from the FA in April three months after our drawing up of the Action Plan, which is coincidentally the beginning of the cricket season and a change of focus in PE, asks; “How are you doing with your implementation of the Action Plan?”
Obviously not enough boxes have been ticked in the local office for Soho Square to tick their boxes.
If we are to be a Football Focus School, and to glow in that privilege, it seems to me that it should be a partnership, not a one way street.
I did make it clear that the FF status had actually made no difference at all and that some support from the FA would be nice in the form of maybe an outside FA qualified coach to come in to run a club or even the donation of some footballs so that we could have one per child in a group of 30, not one between two as all that is all that current funding allows.
I was listened to, and having I thought clearly presented my argument, the response from the FA was...(I was going to pose this as a quiz question but the answer would be too obvious)…another Action Plan!
We need ACTION not Action Plans please FA and maybe a bit of funding so that we can focus on what we see daily our children and school need by way of equipment and not have to tick interminable boxes to justify our needs in terse phrases to fit in pre sized boxes to please the powers that be.
The Sweet FA, how I love them.
26.3.09
We have our new PE shed.
One year after the first rotten floorboard gave way in our 40 year old one and the contents got increasing wet through the holes in the roof the decision to replace could be put off any longer.
It is only a shed, not a purpose built sports centre with changing rooms, toilets and showers, all weather pitch, tennis court, changing rooms but finding the money to buy it was almost as difficult.
As it wasn’t a capital project or major development to support community need, just a shed, to keep our sports kit and equipment dry, we went down the tried and tested rural funding route of cake sales, raffles and bingo rather than faffing about with copious forms, match funding and having to justify need based on political, social, demographic, or physical ability.
Our enterprising pupil Eloise Nelson, who set the ball rolling in the first place by writing to the Prime Minister, led the way.
(Incidentally the PM was too busy bailing out banks with trillions of tax payers money to be able to offer a donation for our new shed). Anyway who needs government.
The local press were brilliant, running the story of Eloise’s campaign and letter to Downing Street and due to this the Shed Fund received donations from Bristol Water, Millfield School (thanks Chris) as well as private donations.
The story in the local press was picked up by BBC 1’s newsround Programme and Eloise became a Press Packer, reporting on her campaign on the Newsround Website.
A few hundred fairy cakes, a sports-related raffle, a stall at the Christmas Fayre later and the invitations for the grand opening are about to go in the post.
One will be sent, out of politeness, to Gordon Brown but what is the betting he doesn’t turn up?
8.1.09
Christian Malcolm is a Commonwealth and Olympic 200m athlete, a world renowned runner and an absolute superstar.
Under the now defunct Activemark Gold Award Scheme, we were permitted a visit from a Sporting Champion to promote the desire and enthusiasm to not only extend our pupils participation in sporting activities but for them to understand the work and dedication that it takes to become, like Christian, a top athlete, a role model and an ambassador.
Christian was brilliant. His warm, friendly laid back approach to his own success and achievements was an instant hit with the St.Lawrence’s pupils.
There was no standing on ceremony and Christian spent the lunch time with the children in the playground playing football and making friends.
His initial visit had a profound impact on the children with the school cross country team which had always been strong doubling its numbers.
One particular pupil, eight-year-old Shaun, had never done cross country but was a cracking footballer.
Christian told the children that had he not discovered athletics that he would have loved to have been a professional footballer and he impressed Shaun with his lunchtime footballing prowess.
Shaun decided that as Christian was so cool, maybe running was cool too, and he took part in the next area cross country race...and won.
Shaun then competed in races during the rest of the season and won every one.
As area winner Shaun then went forward to the regional finals on a very hard course up hills and through woods running against the best that the state and private education system have to offer…and he won!
During this time, the school kept in touch with Christian, the children sending him letters and pictures and Shaun writing to his now favourite sportsperson ever to tell him of his triumphs.
We managed to get Shaun a sponsor, a local cheese producer, Wyke Farms, who make the best cheddar cheese in the world, and he acquired his first ever pair of spikes.
We were then lucky enough to get a return visit from Christian under the Sporting Champions Scheme and now we had something to boast to him about.
Shaun was county champion, and out of 65 pupils in the school with 45 eligible to take part, the cross country team now numbered 30.
Christian again worked his magic on the children by sheer force of an amazingly relaxed and funny personality and Shaun was glued to his side throughout the day.
All the children wrote letters to thank Christian for his return visit and a comment in Shaun’s letter summed up the impact that Christian had had upon him.
“I think you are so cool, I want to be your clone.”
Shaun is now a member of the local athletics club running in races throughout the South West.
He is still only 10 but developing into a fine endurance runner. As it is cool for Shaun three of his fellow pupils have also joined the club and this year, Ellie, who is Shaun’s shadow, competed in her first two races and came fourth in both.
During the Beijing Olympics all the children followed Christian’s progress through to the 200m finals and felt a real connection with him.
Through the beneficence of the Somerset Active Sports Partnership and a fair amount of badgering on my part, Christian is to return to school next week.
After his last visit he promised he would return to tell the children all about the Olympics and true to his word, despite a busy schedule and punishing training, he returns.
The children are so excited and the school honoured. Christian is an exemplary sporting ambassador and has touched and changed our children’s lives.
13.11.08
My last blog told about our desperate search for funding for a PE Shed and a lovely letter that one of our Year 6’s, independently, wrote to Gordon Brown.She has recently had a reply from Jim Knight, Minister of State for Schools and Learners at the Department for Schools and Families.(On their notepaper “department for children, schools and families “ is all written in lower case letters but that is a debate for another forum.)Eloise, who is 11, was delighted when the envelope arrived on her doormat, but less than delighted with the reply which was totally predictable but in a style she and her mother thought rather condescending. “I am sorry that the PE shed at your school needs to be replaced but I do not keep any money here at my office”DOH we all sort of knew that anyway!“This is because as soon as I get it from the taxman I give it straight out again”The reason that Eloise wrote in the first place was the school, nor the local authority have any extra funding available to cover the cost of replacing the shed.We are talking a fairly substantial structure here, weatherproof and sturdy with shelves and hooks and even possibly with a light so that on dark evenings I can put kit away safely without being freaked out by spider webs in the dark, so not a £99.99 B and Q special offer job.Jim Knight’s reply continues:“The local authority which looks after your school is Somerset”DOH again!“The thing you can do is speak to your teacher and see if they have any money left at the school. This is because the government gives schools money for improvements. If, as you say, money for this year has been used up, perhaps money can be found next year.”Never mind Mr Knight. Eloise and her friends are arranging a cake sale to raise some money. She didn’t really expect any money but felt strongly enough to write and good on her for doing so.
By the way the children are also making Christmas Cards to sell to raise money for the Shed Fund. If anyone would like to buy some to send to friends and family they are 20p each, complete with envelope!
15.10.08
As a small school we have mixed age classes and I was talking to the years 4,5 and 6 who learn together.
It was a general discussion and the subject of the Credit Crunch came up. Being erudite youngsters it was a topical discussion and the children were relatively well informed by media and their parents.
The amount of money being put forward by the government to rescue financial institutions came up and we all agreed that we could not get out heads around the £77 billion pounds proposed.
I made a casual remark about how a few hundred pounds to replace the school's rotting PE shed was a drop in the ocean in comparison but that the school did not have the available finance.
This morning I was in the staffroom and a parent came to see me with the copy of a letter that her daughter had written last night and posted on her way to school. It read:
Dear Gordon Brown,
My name is Eloise and I am nearly 11 years old and I go to St.Lawrence's Primary School.
I am writing to say that our school is very interested in sport and we have a PE shed to store all our equipment. Sadly this is old, musty and has several holes in it.
Our PE teacher has had to raise money for our school by writing a book called "Snippets From A Small School" (this costs £5 and I could send you a copy if you like) but sadly that alone cannot pay for a new shed.
The school budget cannot pay for it either so I am asking you if you could kindly make a donation towards our new shed.
Please reply soon.
Yours sincerely
Eloise
I was incredibly touched and I look forward to the Prime Minister's reply.
29.9.08
Being a small village school, we have no playing field of our own but have the use of the village playing field ten minutes walk away across a busy A road.
An erstwhile committee, who meet once a quarter, no more no less, runs this resource. The school pays for the mowing of the grass and the marking of the football pitch.
There are, at the bottom of the field, a set of metal, rusted, adult sized dangerous goalposts which are never used for matches except by local children doing monkey impressions, and their safety has been in question by the school for a long time so we have not used them for years and made do with cones for goals.
We do have portable goals but the logistics of getting them down to the field with 30 children and various other bits of equipment are horrendous.
They cannot be left up so we tend to use cones and play all our competitive matches using the pitches at other local schools.
In February 2008, I received a flyer from the FA about replacing pre-1998 goal posts and the availability of a grant of 50% towards the £738 purchase cost for a set of junior goals.
With the school budget stretched to its limit, with no free cash, I approached the Village Playing Fields Committee about providing funding for the other 50% so that safety and football matches could be restored. Meanwhile I applied to the Football Foundation for a grant.
This application firstly had to be sanctioned by the County FA Development Officer before being passed on to the FA.
Luckily this time period coincided with a committee meeting of the VPC and my case for their match funding the grant was presented.
I was questioned at length about what was wrong with the present goal posts, why we needed new ones and why junior and not senior, where would they be sited, who would put them up, what size would the pitch be, how often would we use them, what would they be made of, would they need painting and I think I answered fully and honestly.
The committee then said that they would discuss my proposal and get back to me.
Meanwhile, God bless, the Football Foundation sanctioned my grant application and gave me three months in which to make the claim.
I passed this good news onto the VPC who had not, they informed me, yet made a decision. Being busy with other things one day I suddenly realised that the three months was almost up and I had heard nothing.
The VPC told me that my request was being discussed at their next meeting after which they would hold a site visit to determine the location of the goalposts.
Back to the FF who kindly gave me a six-week extension to my grant deadline until the end of September.
I was then contacted by the VPC about the cost of the goals. Weren’t they rather expensive and could I find a cheaper alternative.
The Football Foundation approves all the suppliers and the costs vary by a few pounds. I had enlisted the help of one of our parents who does ground works for the LEA to install them free of charge and had to convince the committee that the children’s safety was priceless and that I had obtained 50% towards the cost.
It is now nearly October and I await a final decision. I think it will be positive but then I have to get the cheque from the finance officer of the committee so that the money from the FF can be matched and I can pay the suppliers before the eventual delivery and installation of the goals….just in time for the ….cricket season!
17/9/08
St Lawrence’s is a delightful village school in the heart of deepest, darkest Somerset, nestled in a sleepy hollow under the Mendip Hills.
It has 67 pupils, no sports facilities and is totally ignored by the great and the good of the sporting world and the PE and sport facilitators of the DCMS.
I have decided to stop moaning about the lack of support for rural schools and the complete absence on the map of government and ruling body sporting initiatives and extra funding.
In fact I have crossed the Sports Minister off my Christmas card list and I in the future I am going to celebrate the fact that PE and Sporting logistics in any rural school are challenging, fun often hilarious and put the “Er” back in Zummerset.
I have a claim to fame, usually not advertised but I have now, in my more positive frame of mind, decided to come out to the sporting world. I think I may be one of the only PE Co-ordinators who is legally certified…as a lollipop lady.
The necessity of donning a floor length, yellow, luminous coat, cut to generous proportions that would fit a baby elephant, stunningly attractive matching baseball cap with earflaps, has come about as the school has no on site facilities and has to use the village field ten minutes walk away along a busy A road.
This means crossing over 30 children, each one also wearing an elegant fluorescent jacket emblazoned with the school logo, in our struggle to play sport.
This additional accolade on my CV is maintained by a rigorous testing procedure.
Once a year a man with a clipboard arrives form the County Highways Department and I have to don the luminescent outfit and perform, with my lollipop, to his satisfaction, amongst the passing traffic.
Once certified the laborious procedure of getting children, PE equipment, a rucksack full of first aid kit with inhalers, volumisers and epipens can begin.
A trivia aside. Did you know that every good lollipop person should keep a piece of chalk in their pocket?
The black rectangle across the centre of the lollipop between STOP and CHILDREN is not there for aesthetic purposes but to record, with the chalk, the licence numbers of transgressing motorists should any fail to notice the vibrant yellow blob in the middle of the road with lollipop aloft. The police can then be informed and the motorist duly dealt with.
Anyway back to the PE lesson. Once out of the school gate, the adults laden down with equipment and selective pupils entrusted with cones we line up at the side of the road.
I step out into the traffic and assert my authority, legitimately lifting my lollipop. Once the cars have stopped, Jack has finished chatting, Lucy and Tom are facing the right way and Charlotte has done up her shoelace, we can cross and re assemble on the other side of the road.
At this time of year the field alongside which we line up again is full of cute little lambs, which delight and distract the children. They would prefer to stay and watch them gambolling on the grass than proceed in an orderly fashion to our eventual destination.
Equilibrium restored, I stash my lollipop in to an adjacent hedge for use on the return journey. By now the line of children has split in two. The fast walkers at the front and the plodder’s way behind.
The children need expert herding like the cows that regularly pass through the village on their way to fresh pasture. The weekly chorus from the accompanying adults then starts as regular as cockcrow.
“Walk on” “Giddy up” “Catch up George.” urges them into a vague sense of urgency but in reality has little effect. The next stage of this momentous journey is to pass the pig farm.
In our rural idyll, organically reared rare breeds of pig are commonplace but however posh the pig the smell they produce is uniquely distinctive.
You can tell which way the wind is blowing by the nasal receptors of the children at the front of the line even though you are shepherding the stragglers at the rear.
“Pooh”, “Whiffy”, “Yucky”, “Oh Miss what a stink!” means a brisk south westerly,
as the delicate aroma of the pig manure pile assaults your nostrils.
If it has been raining the collected run off water from the sties holds in a huge puddle of stagnant stink that the children have to steered around.
But yes, you’ve guessed it. There is always one who walks straight through kicking up droplets of the brown liquid on to the backs of the legs of those in front who immediately begin the chorus of; “Oh Miss he splashed me” and the reply from the perpetrator; “I didn’t do it on purpose” said with that; “Oh yes I did” smirk.
Onwards. We now turn in to the lane leading to the field.
There is no pavement on this country byway. There are two large dairy farms and the end of it and a cluster of houses.
Transportation of bales of hay, silage tankers, livestock and the Tesco shopping of residents always seems to occur at 1.00pm on a Friday afternoon.
The ever-watchful adults in the school convoy loudly shout “CAR” or “TRACTOR” on sighting a vehicle.
The well-established routine is for the children to stop, press their bodies back into the hedge and “FREEZE” until the offending motorist has passed by.
Still in my luminescent coat I bravely stand a little further out in the road to be an obvious target should the three-ton Friesian bull in the tractor’s trailer decide to break free and make a run for it.
You would think that with a regimented routine like this order would soon be restored. Well…mostly it is.
Except, statistically, 8% of the children emerge form the hedge having been stung by nettles, 19% stand in the gloopy mud built up at the side of the road from generations of farm traffic. 24% get their PE kit caught on brambles. 52% of the girls stoop to pick flowers. 49% of the boys find goose grass to stick on someone’s back and 100% of the boys manage to illicitly hide a stick about their person.
I have yet to find a tick box on the PESCL form, which covers these eventualities.
Once the detritus from the hedge has been removed and restored to its natural habitat the gate to the field is in sight.
We are nearly at journey’s end, unless the milk tanker hoves into view.In that case I have to step in to lollipop mode again. I have to wildly wave my arms and stop it at the farm entrance.
Logistically even with the children totally flattened against the hedge or even in it, the narrowness of the lane does not allow any combination of children and milk tanker.
It has been tried, by novice drivers, who think that the woman in yellow frantically leaping up and down in the middle of the lane is some Somerset scrumpy addled escapee from the local hostellery but they soon learn.
Eventually, after head counting the children through the gate to make sure that there are none left in the field playing with the lambs, none overcome by fumes form the pig farm, none still stuck in the hedge and none joining the cows going to market, we arrive.
26.8.08
Christian Malcolm may not have won a medal in the 200m at the Beijing Olympics (his race being eclipsed by the wonder of Usain Bolt)
But he is the sixth fastest man in the world at that distance and he won the hearts and minds of the pupils at my school during his two visits there.
Christian initially visited the school under the Sporting Champions Scheme. He was wonderful. Relaxed, funny, warm and everybody, children and staff immediately felt comfortable in his star presence.
He talked to the children about his path to success, his triumphs and failures and his funny moments along the way.
The school loved him so much that they were lucky enough to perused him to come back again.
We, although having only 67 pupils, have a 25 plus strong cross country team - its ranks swelled as a tribute to Christian.
One pupil, nine year old Shaun, was so entranced by Christian and the fact that he was "so cool" came along to his first meet and won......by about 200 metres.
He surprised himself and continued to improve throughout the season winning every race easily including the county finals. He has now joined the local athletics club and is proving to have a natural, easy talent.
After Christian's visit, all the children wrote to him. Some of the letters were very funny. All showed that they were touched that he had taken the time to come to their little school.
In Shaun's letter, he wrote to Christian: “You are so cool and I want to be your clone and run just like you.”
Maybe he will. Maybe he won't. Who knows what the future will bring. But Shaun is working extremely hard to be the best he can become and inspired by Christian.
The Sporting Champions scheme is invaluable and through it we have found in Christian, a hero, a role model, and true sporting inspiration.
Maybe these visits should become the legacy of this years Olympics and in 2012, if not taking part, the 67 children of this school will be cheering our Olympians all the way.
25.7.08
I am miffed...again.
I have worked my little butt off over the years to enhance and improve the sports provision in our little school and was absolutely overwhelmed and delighted when in 2001 and again in 2005 we were awarded an Activemark Gold Award.
We were the smallest school in the south west to receive such an honour and the kudos that went with it was huge for the profile of the school and the children.
Last year, however, this level of award was done away with and as long as you ticked enough boxes on the PESCL form you automatically received an Activemark Award with no differentiation at all.
It was posted on a generic piece of paper by second class post. This presumably to reflect the value of the new award.
A letter to the sports minister generated the usual bland, uninteresting, sterile response with no concept of the deflation felt by the removal of the Gold Award.
Then I receive a letter from the Football Association. Again I worked my butt off to ensure we fulfilled the criteria for the FA Charter Standard Schools Award.
We were the first primary school to meet the standard and went on to be county and regional winners.
This award no longer exists. The FA has done away with it and their emphasis is now
on clubs and not schools
After pleading with primary schools to apply for and develop football strategies to enhance grassroots football, fulfil the categories and gain this prestigious award it too has gone.
It’s demise again was announced by second class post.
So what is there to strive for now? I think I will develop my own award. THE POPE. P***** Off PE Teachers Award.
I bet there will loads of applicants...Mr Sutcliffe.
15.7.08
Being a female referee in the world of junior football and actually knowing, understanding and acting upon the rules of the beautiful game can be an advantage and a disadvantage.
I well remember walking onto a pitch at an U11s inter-school match to take charge of a game.
I have blonde curly hair, an obvious penchant for pink and an engraved silver whistle given to me by a pupil for some birthday with a nought on the end of it. This proudly hangs around my neck on a pink lanyard with "Mrs B" embroidered on it.
As I stepped onto the pitch to start the match I heard a fatherly voice from the touchline say in a loud voice: “Who the **** is she?”
I turned back, walked towards him, held out my hand, complete with short but pink varnished nails and said: “Good afternoon, I am the referee.”
He, before having time to think and digest the information, automatically shook my hand and I walked to the centre to begin the game.
Luckily the first half passed without major incident. No audible swearing, no spitting, no abuse of the referee from the parents. (The children behaved beautifully).
A quick drink at half time, change of ends, substitutions made and the second half began. A couple of feee kicks, a goal to each side, well played but incident free football.
The children shook hands did the “three cheers” and the proceedings ended. As I walked off the pitch I saw the father walking towards me. This time he held out his hand, shook mine and said: ‘Well reffed.’ Pink rules OK!
18.6.08
An Ode To Tesco
Thank you Tesco for the vouchers we all collect
To enhance the contents of PE sheds
Which the Government neglects.
They have put in lots of money
To Create SSP’s and PDMS
But forgotten that a school needs hard cash
To buy not only books and pens
But footballs, netballs, cricket bats
To enable the kids to play
Hockey sticks, hockey balls
So that on a sunny day
The teachers at the coal face
In a playground with 30 kids
Can give them EACH a tennis racket….so
That they all can have a go.
Thank you Tesco for that amazing feeling
When the parcels all arrive
And you can delve into the cardboard
To see the goodies all inside.
Thank you Tesco for when the children realise
We’ve got new balls that aren’t half flat
That they can have one each in a lesson
And think the PE teacher is “all that”
Thank you Tesco for doing what the government should do
Instead of moaning and blaming schools
For obesity and behavioural problems
And the breaking of school rules
Thank you Tesco for enabling me to do my job
For equipment and not strategies
Filling in forms for a nameless blob.
Now I can get the children out
To catch and kick and hit
With all our wonderful new sporty things
Thank you Tesco for every bit
22.4.08
Playing and having the opportunity to participate in all kinds of sport contributes to the self confidence and development of children.
But there is nothing like the buzz of taking them to watch live sport with a live crowd and being able to watch the best in the game putting into practice the skill of the sport you are trying to teach them.
We recently took a coach load of children and parents to watch Gloucester versus Newcastle Falcons at Kingsholm.
This small village school has forged links with Gloucester Rugby Club over the past few years and their excellent community department, run by Paul Rudland, and despite being enormously busy have been nothing but supportive by sending coaches to the school and welcoming the children to match days on several occasions.
On this day very excited children from the age of 6 to 11 gathered at the school early in the morning to await their coach to whisk them up the motorway to Kingsholm.
The coach was due to arrive at 9.00am at school for arrival at the ground at 11.00am. By 9.15am there was no sign of the coach and I had been asked as to its whereabouts by assorted children and parents for the thousandth time.
I was totally blasé about the siituation assuring them of its imminent arrival but underneath totally frantic. A bit like a duck gliding on top of the water whilst paddling furiously underneath.
On phoning the coach company they told me they thought that the coach was due to arrive at the school at 11.00am and on checking realised their mistake and dispatched the missing vehicle to us post haste.
I then tentatively phoned Gloucester knowing that, with a busy match day, we were timetabled to the nth minute and would be late, upsetting all their plans. They couldn’t have been nicer assuring me all was fine and they would see us later.
On eventual arrival we were met at the gates by Paul Rudland given a whistle stop tour of the new stand, very impressive, and then, while the parents discovered the location of the various refreshments, I took the children out onto the pitch for an hours coaching with the community coaching staff.
Gloucester are a club who realise that role models for young primary children are extremely important and they always summon up some of the biggest rugby players they can find to come and meet the children.
The physical impression these six foot plus blokes have on two foot plus children is amazing and certainly create a wow factor.
The players, this time it was England and Gloucester Number 8 James Forrester, are brilliant, answering questions, signing autographs and posing for photographs giving the children positive messages about professional rugby.
After the coaching the children watched the teams warm up and again the players from both Gloucester and the Falcons had no hesitation in signing autographs.
The rugby itself was fantastic, the atmosphere electric and the children and parents totally immersed in the game.
At half time the children put on a display of touch rugby for the 13,000 crowd and were watched by proud parents and warmly applauded even by the Shed at the end of their demonstration. They were so chuffed with themselves as they re took their seats.
A close second half saw Gloucester score a try to beat Newcastle in the dying minutes and much to the amusement of the children an excitable Gloucester supporter sitting behind us jumped up with beer in hand as the try was scored and out of the 13,000 crowd who did the beer land all over……me! So a wet end to a brilliant day out.
The parents had such a good time, the children were totally engaged by the coaching and the atmosphere of the pre match and match and several appeared at school on the Monday morning sporting Gloucester hats and scarves purchased in the shop after the game.
As a school we can’t wait for the next Gloucester moment and will be pestering the community department to visit us in the near future.
The whole experience was wonderful and reinforced the love that this school has for the game. Thank you Gloucester.
8.2.08
My pet hate. Whenever you see governing bodies of any sporting discipline advertising the availability of grant aid to help aid the delivery of sport in a school, as a PE provider your heart sinks when you see the words “your grant must be match funded.”
That means rousing the PTA for yet another fundraising idea when they have just spent a year raising money for a classroom computer and the parents have raffled every cuddly toy they owned, been sponsored out and have bought so may jars of jam that the WI would be envious.
That means writing to local business who write back and say they are only supporting a named charity for the current financial year, that their sponsorship budget has closed for the time being to be reviewed or many who don’t even bother to reply.
It means creeping to the finance committee of the governing body who say that all funds are allocated and the core curriculum has too many financial demands upon it.
Any spare money in the budget can no longer be carried over to the next financial year or the LEA will take it back and must be ring fenced for capital projects.
It means phoning the local area sporting representative of the governing body who tells you that there is no local funding to match fund it is all spent and they didn’t have much anyway and to approach your PTA. Full circle.
In a rural community where there are no big businesses, very few small businesses, a PTA which is expected to annually support school residential trips, theatre visits, computers, new books, drama workshops and the like, the opportunities to raise match funding are few and far between.
We don’t expect owt for nowt and in the end have a boot sale and a cake stall and a sponsored skip but in an ideal world the words match funding would disappear for ever.
25.1.08
As a small state primary school, we were honoured to be invited by Millfield Prep School to play them in a football match.
We arrived, from our modest village school with very little except for a few old Pratten buildings and a bumpy playground, at the splendours of Edgarley on the Somerset Levels with its equestrian ring to the left, cricket pitches and nets to the right, rugby pitches as far as the eye could see, the occasional climbing wall and way beyond, in the distance, past the cross country course and the indoor tennis courts, a football pitch.
The geography of the Somerset Levels, for the uninitiated and those who haven’t watched Time Team, is that it is a wetland habitat with each field edged by rhynes or ditches usually filled with water and mud or Phil Harding with a trowel uncovering bronze age artefacts and Tony Robinson bobbing up from the depths to announce the end of day two.
Our team of mixed age and key stage footballers with assorted kit took to the pitch to face the might of Millfield who had provided a proper referee in real referee black which impressed us immediately.
I will mention that we went one up in the first five minutes and I am sure Chris Twort, head of junior football, won’t mind if we gloat a little, and the match progressed.
Our travelling parents were a little loud but it was good natured support injected with a little pride and amazement that we were actually winning.
The ball suddenly flew off the pitch over the parent’s heads and “plop” into the adjacent rhyme. Ever resourceful, one of our mums, in her zebra-striped wellies (we do fashion well in Somerset) said “I’ll get it” and disappeared from view. Problem solved.
The ball was chucked out of the rhyne, cleaned off and the kids got back to their football.
Unexpectedly our throw in was accurate, straight to the feet of our very own Michael Owen who controlled it, shot, and the ball went into the net.
The touchline parents were apoplectic, jumping up and down, cheering and forgetting any sense of place or decorum as we went 2-0 up. (Sorry Chris but it has to be mentioned)
Now the other geological quirk of Somerset mud and water in the rhynes is that it is very gloopy and has the consistency of thick porridge which sucks anything landing upon it into its peaty depths very quickly.
We, in the excitement of the moment, had entirely forgotten about our intrepid mum who minutes before the goal had gone into the rhyne without thought of her own well being to retrieve the ball.
When the referee had returned the ball to the centre spot and we had calmed down, we heard this “Will someone bl***y get me out of here” from behind us.
A mass parental rush to the edge of the rhyne saw the mother in distress up to the top of her zebra-striped wellies in mud and superbly stuck.
Once we had recovered from the stomach-creasing laughter that enveloped us, we had to form a human chain to pull our intrepid mother out. She was so firmly stuck and sinking fast.
We gathered ourselves and got back to concentrating on the football a great match which we won 5-1.
The hospitality of Millfield is now legendary in the annals of our school as we got sausage and chips after the match! The children were far more excited about this that the fact that they had won.
Being lunchbox kids, the wonderment of going into a real school canteen with hot food was almost more exciting than they could bear.
All memories of the match and their rare victory were forgotten as they tucked into their delicious food and, joy of joys, discovered that there was a conveyor belt to take the dirty plates back to the kitchen.
I have never seen children scramble to rid the tables of dirty plates and cutlery so fast just so they could watch them disappear into the kitchen through a hatch.
We play Millfield again this month in what has now become an annual fixture. The rhyne has been affectionately renamed ‘Megan’s Ditch’ and the children can’t wait for the match to end, before they have even played, so that they can tuck into their sausage and chips in the Millfield canteen.
17.1.08
Sporting initiatives by the governing bodies of the sporting disciplines are brilliant.
They engage and enthuse children and support the school teaching staff with new ideas and equipment.
However, small rural primary schools rarely get a look in.
You open papers, sports magazines and see these wonderful pictures and stories of the great and the good of the sporting world visiting primary schools to introduce the latest initiative and the school are 99% of the time in inner city deprived areas within travelling distance of the major football clubs, rugby clubs, athletics clubs or cricket grounds.
That in itself is wonderful. Inner city schools are deprived but rural schools may not be as deprived in a social sense but in a sporting sense they are equally so.
Many of these schools have no or poor sporting facilities, are housed in old buildings with no sports hall, small playgrounds and any purpose built sporting facilities an expensive coach ride away.
There are hundreds such schools across the country who cannot forge links with academies or visit clubs to take part in their educational activities as the clubs themselves concentrate only on schools in their immediate vicinity and small schools get left out of the picture completely due to their geographic location or simply their postcode.
We have a BA postcode, to the onlooker Bath, a well-heeled community. Were we a few miles further down the road and had a BS, Bristol postcode, we would be looked on very differently.
As a school in BA code we are presumed to be in an affluent area and socially we are. But where sport is concerned we have less than most schools in the country and have to work extremely hard and become vociferous and a nuisance to get our children the sporting input that they need and deserve.
So sporting initiatives are brilliant and may we have more. But please don’t forget the small rural schools who work with a different kind of deprivation but whose children are equally deserving and will also be the future of sport not only as players but as paying spectators helping to keep sport alive
3.1.08
Teaching sport in a small rural primary school brings it’s own rewards and challenges. Teams, due to the small number of children in any one year group, are usually mixed age, often mixed sex and sometimes mixed key stage.
This has huge benefits for the younger able children who do not have to wait until year 6 to be included in a team. Those less able and not the obvious sports stars also get a game. Whilst not all the players have enormous talent, the prestige and self-esteem gained from just being included in a school team, wearing school strip, reflects in the obvious pride in themselves as they strut across the playground to go to the match and the confidence gained often translates into the classroom and playground environment.On one particular occasion we were playing the local huge primary school. They put out a team of year sixes physically huge compared to our assorted band of merrymen ranging from year 3 upwards.It was a bit like Dagenham and Redbridge taking on Arsenal but our pride was high. It was also a bit like England v Croatia as the rain was blowing horizontally across the pitch and our defence soaking wet and stationary with the cold looked very reminiscent to the football scene from Kes.By half time we were six nil down but a swift half time team talk and rub down sent the team back out with renewed vigour.
I was talking to a parent on the touchline when I suddenly heard a roar and saw Stewart, age 9, and probably our best player, stick thin and pale, soaking wet and muddy running towards me with tears pouring down his face.
I thought he was injured and ran towards him. In the middle of the pitch he threw his arms around me and said through his tears “I just scored I’m so happy!”
We lost 8-1 but that goal has stayed in the memory and in school football history. The next morning Stewart was lauded in the playground as the hero of the hour. He now plays for Somerset, trains at Millfield in their elite academy and has hopes of a professional career in football.
Maybe his Kes moment started it all! |
Guy Fletcher is the Director of Sport at Bedford School
26.1.10
Over 100 million people from all over the world last year down loaded the You Tube video of Susan Boyle on ‘Britain’s Got Talent’.
It would appear that, contrary to perceived views, people actually quite like being witness to a reversal of expectation, a snub at the complacent self-fulfilling prophesies of those who sit in arrogant judgement over the efforts of innocent neophytes.
Despite exposure to a diet of sneering condemnation, this response to positive affirmation is encouraging. Notwithstanding the focus on rejection and the ridiculing of ineptitude, for once the proclamation of unpredicted excellence is cheerfully and robustly celebrated.
For a long time now I have bored whoever wants to listen by trying to state the anomaly of what we as physical educationalists want to promote and what it is the media would like us to embrace.
Be it the irritatingly contrived Ann Robinson or the nauseatingly self-congratulatory Alan Sugar, we are encouraged to champion the overt derision of those whose aspirations will never be matched by their talent and those who have tried hard but fallen short of the mark.
Any hint of the desirability of support for those who are less fortunate than ourselves is dismissed and is replaced by a culture of insidious bullying by some disdainful adjudicator who has been set in judgement over the less able.
We see it time and again. From the Dragon’s Den to the X Factor we are enticed into siding with the panel of witlessly unaware celebrities whose success rating is apparently dependent on how hurtful and demeaning they can make their insults.
In schools, in sport and in PE, we encourage team games and we endorse support for the team member who is struggling, whose confidence is shattered and for whom rejection would be unpalatable.
We promote expressions of backing such as ‘Hard luck, well tried, good effort, don’t worry.’ I would like to believe we condemn the team member who says ‘You’re useless, you’re dropped.’
One of the most difficult tasks facing any coach is the dropping of a player. I recall support for Jack Rowell during his tenure as England Rugby coach in his dropping of players by public notice.
Apparently not previously talking to the player was a sign of strength. On the contrary I believe that that is palpably the weakest method of exacting this action.
Any coach owes it to his players to discuss with them the reason behind their demise. The players won’t like it, they will disagree, but it is their prerogative to be offered a constructive and informative explanation of the reasoning.
It seems a desperate shame that the lead of the ‘significant other’ flies in the face of this most important human response.
I am sure I am not alone in wishing that there were more Susan Boyles around and less of the likes of Sugar, Robinson, Paphitis, and Cowell.
In their case and their case alone the words ‘You’re fired!’ would come as a welcome relief.
25.6.08
Sometime back in May 2004, Russian tennis player Marat Safin celebrated a minor success at the French Open by mooning to the crowd.
It goes without saying that Safin himself found it all tremendously amusing - all good, harmless fun - and was indignant that the tennis officials didn’t share his slant on what is or what is not humorous.
He was deducted a point, which seemed pretty lenient, but it didn’t stop Safin ranting that it was an over-reaction and that the authorities were trying to destroy the match. ‘All the people that run the sport, they have no clue,’ he whined.
All this was pretty inconsequential and it wasn’t Safin’s protestations that surprised me, nor the support he received from the crowd and subsequently from fellow players.
We have long had to witness tennis crowds baying with laughter at the puerile antics of the likes of Jimmy Connors and seemingly entranced by the offensive belligerence of John McEnroe.
What I recall surprising me was the support he received from certain members of the media who seemed united in the opinion that this was just what tennis needed - ‘a character’.
Now, call me old fashioned, but is this not the same media that jump on the anti-yob culture bandwagon and condemn the behaviour of the likes of football supporters who also seem to find some sort of succour in exposing untanned expanses to unfortunate passers by?
Now how is it different for a sportsman? Why do we promote the excesses of such as Safin? Why do we laud the gaping excesses of Andrew Murray and forgive the banality of such as McEnroe.
Andy Murray’s mother Judy Murray recalled recently: “I remember one parent trying to intimidate Andy in an U12 boys' doubles match. The dad was applauding Andy's double-faults and shouting loudly. Andy ended up hitting a ball towards him, as if to say, 'Will you just shut up?”
The irony of Mrs Murray’s apparent vindication of Murray junior’s response is, I suspect, evident to all but the Murray clan.
Hitting a tennis ball towards a spectator, whatever the provocation, is probably not the way forward, yet Judy seems to believe it is a perfectly reasonable response from an eleven year old. We grow what we sow.
It is a little perturbing to note that Andy Murray has insisted in a recent article that he won't be changing his ways anytime soon. Look out Centre Court.
So Wimbledon is back with us and with it the shrieking crowds of once-a-year supporters whose highlights will inevitably include the players’ abuse of hapless officials, the extraordinary volume of the grunts of the female stars, the hilarious antics of at least one player handing his racket to a ball boy, a couple of exposures of male flesh and the all too regular sight of Andrew Murray’s epiglottis.
Inevitably children throughout the country will ape these antics and schools will have to pick up the pieces. Teacher v Role Model. I suspect we all know who is likely to provide the overriding influence.
Whatever you say about Tim Henman, at least he was couth. He may not have been a ‘character’ but even though his only action now is patting a ball back to his offspring, he’s still Britain’s sixth ranked player And that, I suspect, is another of British tennis’ problems.
18.6.08
I’m worried about sports scholarships.
This actually isn’t a recent worry. I’ve worried about scholarships for a long time. Even before I started worrying about falling house prices, spiralling weight and the fact that pub gardens have become full of smokers, I worried about scholarships.
It’s not that Bedford doesn’t offer awards of sorts. Several years ago we even adopted South African cricketers for the summer and German hockey players for the Easter term. It was certainly a quick fix and the relevant sports were strengthened in that era. But I worried even then about the integrity of the system. Others then worried too, and when we looked likely to be fostering the fastest bowler ever to bestride the veld, we thankfully dropped the system.
Our system now is pretty transparent and the intention is to offer a Bedford education to talented sportsmen who might otherwise have come nowhere near affording it. We are conscious, too, of our need to retain our home grown players who might otherwise be tempted by other schools with deep pockets and big ambitions. We are attempting to be charitable in all the accepted senses and to follow all the most recent charitable status / public benefits guidelines.
I worry, however, that in some establishments in the past there has been a propensity for the system to escalate and for focus on what school sport is all about to become blurred. First team success becomes the measure of sporting achievement.
In some instances, already, we are finding that when we come to compete at first team level we are suddenly confronted by players who have honed their skills at different institutions, under different influences and who have been lured to new pastures by tempting financial inducements.
There are new accents, new samatotypes and new philosophies. Some I have heard of in the recent past have been barely more than gap students who have rocked up for a couple of geography lessons in an attempt to legitimise the process.
I believe it is time for all of us to look carefully at our policies on sixth form scholars. I am keen particularly that we get the balance right at Bedford. I want to take pride in the fact that we develop our own home grown players, most of who have played together since the fourth form and many of them since the days of rounders, tig and conkers.
I have too an empathy with the boys who have represented the school in the formative years and who see the possibility of their projected first team place snatched from them by an ‘import’.
This is not to say that I am unaware of what boys from outside have brought to the school and it is rewarding to note how easily they have settled and how well they have adapted to their new surroundings. In many cases, too, their attitude and approach has set exemplary standards for their new team mates.
As sport increasingly becomes a marketing tool, I know that in the future many independent schools, Bedford included, will also be taking in a few deserving loxer sixth formers.
Here, they will be boys who have sought us, not the other way round and who might otherwise not have afforded a Bedford education.
My hope is that they will quickly embrace the ethos of our school sport. I have every confidence that we will get the balance right. But it doesn’t stop me worrying.
16.5.08
“Please Sir, can I be captain?”
His little flushed and pudgy face loomed into view, his eyes filled with unwarranted optimism, his waddling gate, as he stumbled towards me, revealing his total lack of credentials.
It was not an easy question to field. It ranked alongside, “When can we have a game?” and “We did this last week” as one of those slightly irritating pupil responses that you get from time to time.
Until Rio Ferdinand was appointed England football captain, Martin Shreeves was possibly the least likely candidate in whole of the Northern Hemisphere for such role. Ill-coordinated, over weight, lacking in presence and more importantly lacking in peer regard, he had all too often in the past fallen victim to the ‘give the fat boy the pads’ philosophy and for Martin this was unsurprisingly a galling frustration.
Responsibility for him had proved an elusive ambition and it was this that spurred him to put in this captaincy request on every possible occasion.
It made me reflect on what qualities a leader should possess. Why was Brierley excellent and Botham inept? What made Ramsay and Clough successful whilst and Charlton and Moore palpably lacked any managerial credentials?
For every Martin Johnson, why is there always a Martin Shreeves? As I struggled to address the situation I was reminded of two captains I knew from the past who, like young Shreeves, were possibly not naturally suited to their elevated role.
At a time when Bedford Cricket club were attempting to recruit some younger players, an enthused tyro from a local school was conscripted to make up numbers for ‘the Ramblers’ the Club’s Sunday 3rd XI. Rupert was to be part of a new regime, a player to be cultivated and charmed, to be indulged and flattered in the hope and expectation that he might enrol a few of his cricketing peers.
From his position at third man at both ends, Rupert watched as the opposition accumulated some 240 for very few wickets. He was not pushy by nature but at about this juncture he felt the time right to approach the captain, Pricey, who was statuesque in his usual position at slip.
Pricey was a painter and decorator by trade (his attire suggested that his whites served him in both roles) and he hugely enjoyed his Sunday relief from the tedium of turpentine and tempera. He saw his management style as more Churchillian than Blairite.
‘Excuse me Mr Price, but I do bowl a bit too,’ the young lad ventured.
Now Pricey was aware of the newly instigated charm initiative but by now he was hot and bothered and in no mood for negotiation. Inevitably he resorted to type.
‘If you don’t like fielding, you can **** off,’ was his considered response.
The aspiring spinner and three of his mates joined Southill Park and Bedford Town Cricket Club folded*. Pricey is seen no longer up ladders or in the slips. He is missed.
In contrast, a surprisingly reasoned approach was demonstrated by a well known Bedford Rugby Club captain of the late 70’s. After yet another defeat, all the players had been summoned to the changing room for the skipper to offer his post match debrief.
This was not a little unnerving for this charismatic captain was not known for his penchant in delivering Woodwardian homilies. Entertainment yes, (he was the same player who caused the coach driver to announce that he refused to leave Llanelli “until the gentleman at the back gets out of the luggage rack”) reasoned scrutiny no.
In the event, his offerings were, initially at least, uncharacteristically thoughtful and sensitive.
“We are moving you from wing to centre Lloydy as your defence is sound. Thommo you are moved to the blind side to make way for the new Cambridge Blue at 7. Pete, you deserve another chance at outside centre….” And so it went on, unusually analytical and constructive.
Predictably it couldn’t last.
As with Pricey, the urge that is in all of us to resort to type was all too strong and his coup de grâce was his final synoptic snippet. Our full back, a promising tyro who had been dogged by a lack of confidence and had struggled to regain form, nervously awaited his appraisal. At a time when a balanced and considered summary was surely called for and for which we awaited with bated breath, it all went horribly wrong.
‘Oh yeah, and we’ve dropped you ‘Robbo’ because you played like a twat.’
Sport is a sort of unscripted drama and I suggest that, in the final analysis, it is captains who possess an appropriate ‘type’ to which to resort that are likely to be the most successful. It is those who possess the innate ability to deal with the unpredicted under pressure that are likely to come to the fore; in modern parlance those who can instinctively reveal and implement a credible ‘Plan B’.
A former Cambridge University Cricket Captain summed it up by saying that a good captain manages to retrieve the situation when, at a post match function, having just been presented by his opposite number with an elaborately engraved cut glass fruit bowl he hands over, without apparent embarrassment, a tea towel depicting scenes of his home town.
On reflection, I deduced that my little mate Martin Shreeves was likely to be just as successful as Martin Johnson in salvaging that sort of scenario and it has to be said that he revelled in his newly acquired status as captain of the red’s hockey VII.
I am pretty sure, too, that he was happy in those pads.
* Bedford Town CC has recently reformed and is going great guns and would welcome all young aspiring local cricketers.
28.4.08
A while ago, whilst I was sitting, tongue lagging, adding yet another layer of Tipp-Ex to the PE account book, a grey haired chap with a sprightly gait, twinkling eyes, a discernable accent and a dubious baseball cap walked into the PE office and introduced himself.
Whilst, admittedly, it wasn’t that hard for him to provide a counter attraction to the shocking figures that seemed to be unravelling in the debit column, it has to be said that I was drawn immediately to what he had to say.
It transpired that Peter (Dr Peter M. Usher, PhD; ChPC) was a Canadian sports psychologist who had moved recently to Bedford after a long and illustrious involvement with Canadian Olympic athletes. A more recent brush with Premier League Football clubs had persuaded him that there was more to life than attempting to spread the word to partially deaf ears astride stubbornly intransigent brains. He was keen to adopt Bedford School and we were eager to foster him.
Some time later I stood watching a rugby Sevens tournament with him and felt I ought to purvey to him (more than to the boys really) my knowledge of the sport by proffering some advice to the players. ‘Jamie, keep away from contact’ was the gist of the pretty platitudinous but undoubtedly correct advice.
I could see Peter was far from impressed by this interjection and I wondered why. Heck he is a footballer / ice skater / ice hockey man. How would he purport to criticise that little pearl of wisdom?
What he said made a lot of sense and actually has made me think even more of the implications of the advice we give.
His point was that when we put forward pointers like that, the players hear just such as the word ‘contact’. The brain struggles with the inverse concept of the rest of the suggestion and their response is the reverse of what we are invoking.
When you think about it he is probably right. We are all familiar with the criticism of Corporal Jones’s ‘Don’t panic. Don’t panic.’ What is the result of his agitated cajolement? Everyone inevitably panics.
I happened to be reading recently Russell Brand’s autobiography ‘My Booky Wook’ (no excuses) and I was reminded by a passage in it of Peter’s advice. Brand recalls an incident with an avuncular gardener that the young Russell had befriended. The pensioner leaves the young lad on his allotment and asks him not to stamp on the flowers. Brand had not even considered the option until the thought was implanted in his head. And of course what does he do? He proceeds to stamp all over the flowers.
We all reckon that we have a bit of the amateur psychologist within us and yet having a professional one around doesn’t half sharpen up your thought processes. Peter was a significant cog in the coaching machine that took our Under 15’s to victory a couple of years ago in the Daily Mail Cup final against arguably a better side. It is hard to dismiss his contributions.
I caught up with Peter yesterday on the Pavilion. ‘Peter, don’t forget to read my forthcoming bit on you on the School Sport Magazine webpage.’ I urged.
“Will do Fletch, but I think you should be saying, ‘Remember to read my bit…..”
Peter has an endearing way of patronising me.
31.3.08
Some ten years ago, on a balmy July afternoon, I witnessed the most belligerent destruction of a bowling attack to which I have ever been privy.
In a blistering exhibition of flamboyant stroke-play, the tenacious assailant reached his half century with a towering six into the biology department pond before raising his bat to acknowledge the somewhat less than fulsome acclaim of the assembled throng.
That the batsman hadn’t assumed a left handed stance after reaching twenty-five as was the custom, was partially immaterial. That he was using full size bat, pads and other cricket equipment was only vaguely relevant.
That the bowlers and fielders, who had risked life and limb in their efforts to contain the onslaught, were members of the Bedford Preparatory School U11s was probably the most significant factor in the whole shambolic episode.
Mr Carter had achieved a life long ambition, the night-time recollection of which would send him into a deep and satisfied slumber for many years to come. He had completed his maiden fifty in his final Fathers’ Match and he could retire content from competitive sport.
Sadly that wasn’t the final chapter in Mr Carter’s sporting career, nor was it his final visit to the school estate.
Having demolished his son’s bowling as a ten year old he now unwittingly set out to demolish his son’s sporting career by attempting to live his own life through his boy.
On the touchline, boundary, poolside and sports hall balcony, be it match, warm up or practice Mr Carter’s presence loomed large. He was never reticent. The intention was worthy but the effect calamitous.
Carrying his son’s kit, timing his 100 metres breaststroke, strapping on his pads and colouring in his run charts he became, for his son, an ever present ogre.
Far from the support he hoped and pertained to be, Dad, despite every good intention, became a burden; a weight to be carried, an expectation to be matched.
Young Marcus was playing always encumbered by the yoke of attempting to bring fulfilment to too wide an array of influences and to an over indulgent parent.
Marcus left school two years ago. He has not played sport in anger again. He has become the ultimate ‘would’ve, could’ve, should’ve’ sportsman.
The kit that his Dad carried for him so dutifully has been resigned to the dustbin, the aspirations his Dad held for him resigned to the bin of ‘unfulfilled potential’ - squeezed in the top, crushed by the lid.
It was hard to fit it all in … it is a pretty full bin.
26.2.08
If rugby union hadn’t evolved over a couple of centuries it would surely never exist as it does today.
Who would take seriously in the 21st century the introduction of a game where dead ball restarts are initiated by forming two lines of players, throwing the ball roughly down the middle and then, and this is biggest anomaly of the whole charade, lifting a couple of eighteen stone players to arms’ length to try to catch it?
Who would then structure a scoring system in order to encourage open play and the scoring of tries and yet penalise tries scored out wide by dictating that the ensuing conversion attempt is taken from the touchline? This is at the same time as the law makers are trying to reduce the impact of goal kickers.
Who would devise a system where the team kicking the ball from the field after a penalty is given a far more than even chance of winning it back from the ensuing line out? And who, in his right mind, would let evolve the present collision culture and consequent penalty-inducing shambles that occurs at each and every ruck?
I have been pondering over some radical solutions and am beginning to convince myself that they are not all entirely flippant.
Firstly, you open the game up by reducing the number of players. Players are bigger now and occupy more of the field. You can’t make the pitch bigger as too much money has been spent on new stadia so you make more space by getting rid of the biggest of the players, the second row forwards. They are, and I risk offending some close mates here, the dinosaurs of the game.
Bear in mind that you have already eliminated line outs so now you don’t need 6’ 8” leviathans with taped up thighs (they can find careers elsewhere - look at Bayfield, he’s hardly struggling to find the next crumb.)
To reconcile this loss, you restart the game after the ball has left the field by awarding the non-infringing side a free kick style tap. Not only does this get rid of the anachronism that is the line out but it also discourages players from kicking the ball off the field.
Now to the scrum. Without the second row, the flankers bind in their space. This effectively ties in the very players whose primary role is to prevent open play from the opposition. That’s a result in itself. You also reduce the pressure applied to the necks of front row players and consequently reduce the risk of injury.
Now, with more open play and more tries out wide, you legislate that all conversions are to be taken from in front of the posts on the twenty-two. In one fell swoop you encourage enterprise, make the game safer and diminish the contribution of the goal kicker.
The scoring system? Why not just have three, two, one? Three for a try, two for a penalty and drop goal and one for a conversion? A much simpler system, and, if you look at results over the years, (work it out for last Saturday’s Six Nations Matches) a system which will invariably produce exactly the same match results.
This is my blue print and I was smugly happy with it until I had a remorseful reflection. I envisaged the scene of all those legendary locks put prematurely out to pasture; those great players grazing languidly in forsaken meadows. The Willy John McBrides of the game, the Delme Thomases, Martin Bayfields, the Pinetree Meeds and the Niel Diments (perhaps only West Country followers recall Neil but I played with him and he has a place here in my book). What a loss to the game they would have been.
But just as sentiment was in danger of getting in the way of logic, I recalled playing for Bedford against Swansea back in the 70’s and encountering another legendary lock, Geoff Wheel, in his prime.
Geoff had a reputation for being pretty uncompromising and was also renowned for having a less than discreet twitch. ‘You don’t have to worry about Geoff,’ I was reassured ahead of the game. ‘You can tell when he is about to land a punch because he twitches just before his wind up.’
Now that Bedford side of the seventies were a lot of things, but they were not the bravest outfit that ever bestrode Swansea’s Mumbles Ground. Midway through the second half Geoff duly twitched, an alarming sight in itself which brought gasps of anticipation from the field and terraces. It was certainly not an understated ‘tic’ and I was transfixed by it.
The response from my team mates was instantaneous and noteworthy. Each player within ten metres adopted what airlines now label the ‘Brace Position’ and remained crouched for what seemed like minutes. So startled was I that I remained standing, and I have to surmise that I was unreasonably fortunate to survive the ensuing haymaker that winged its indiscriminate way over the supine bodies of my team mates and onwards towards my delicate features.
So, on due reflection, and bearing in mind my close encounter with Geoff Wheel, the second row can go after all. Sorry Martin, Delme, Colin et al. But I am sure you will be able to occupy your time constructively by knocking lumps out of each other in between stints of grazing. Present day rugby would have a representative too; Nathan Hines would be there, revelling in the opportunity to slug it out with more established opponents.
Remember too that brace position – it served the Bedford players well that afternoon.
12.2.08
I went to a conference a couple of years ago, the aim of which was to establish sporting links between independent schools and the maintained sector.
The delegates were independent school sports’ staff, the speakers were representatives of state funded education and the theme was, ‘come and join the party’.
The party in question was to be an extravagant affair, hosted by state schools and celebrating the notion that participation in sport was the panacea for all number of ills.
Come dressed as you like, but bring along a cricket pitch or a weights facility or a floodlit astro. The perception behind the party was that, by introducing pupils to sport, truancy was reduced, academic standards improved and wayward children were brought into line.
The invitation was extended to the independent sector because the presumption was that public schools were likely to possess better sporting facilities than their state school equivalents.
Richard Caborn spoke rousingly before being chauffeured off to his next sporting freebie. We all had a quick glance at the Old Trafford changing rooms and a feeling of corporate well-being descended before tea, biscuits and the train home. (Well actually a quick couple of pints at the Dog and Partridge just to avoid the possibility of having to attend the school calendar meeting back at Bedford, but that’s not entirely relevant).
There is nothing wrong with the thinking behind all this and it was keenly embraced by many of the delegates. Public Schools possess wonderful facilities invariably sited in superbly manicured grounds, tended by dedicated ancillary personnel and staffed by well qualified and motivated coaching teams.
Of course these should be shared by those who are less fortunate in their prospects of accessing decent facilities. Why should those beautifully tended cricket squares be used for just twelve weeks each year, those striped fairways be occupied only during the ridiculously short weeks of the public school term? The thrust of it all makes a lot of sense.
And yet over the couple of pints we reflected. Firstly, was it not the public schools who first came up with the theory that, by occupying young people physically, they are less likely to fall foul of authority?
Was it not Thomas Arnold at Rugby who inaugurated the concept of muscularity as a way of tempering the excesses of the masses? (He threw in the Chapel as 50% of a two pronged attack and called the whole package ‘Muscular Christianity’ but it was essentially by exhausting the wilful young aristocrats in the afternoon that he managed to subdue them sufficiently for them to endure uncomplainingly the potential tedium of the evening service).
So the thought of presenting to independent school sports staff this ‘new’ initiative and unveiling it as a cracking new idea, left me a little bemused. It seemed a bit like launching a campaign to convince alcoholics of the merits of downing gallons of strong cider.
There was another thought that nagged at me too. What about those parents who save assiduously, make sacrifices and forgo foreign holidays in order that their offspring should enjoy the benefits of these excellent facilities?
It is right that these folk who are paying for the upkeep, tending and refurbishment of the kit that should now, apparently become available to others at no cost? Might they not have the right to some indignation particularly as they are in effect paying twice, through taxes and fees, for their children’s education?
The need to address this whole scenario has been made more urgent by the Charity Commission guidance to independent schools which suggest that one way of complying with the “public benefit” test would be to lend teachers and facilities such as playing fields and gyms to state schools. The teacher bit seems to me to be more than a little patronising but again there is some sort of credibility in the whole initiative.
Like in all these things, there are masses of questions to be addressed but at least there are some independent schools that are forging a way forward.
Some, and Bedford has been a prime motivator in this, are introducing means’ tested awards and scholarships. Partly, admittedly, driven by these new charitable status requirements and partly, I trust, guided by social conscience, they are working towards making their education available to a wider public.
At Bedford there has been introduced a package of awards whereby pupils from less financially privileged backgrounds are assisted with fees in accordance with their family income.
Scholarships of 10% are awarded to the most gifted regardless of their family’s financial status but there is also a cache of self generated money, made available to assist greatly those who might otherwise not have been able to benefit from what the school has to offer.
Initially this scheme is potentially self harming - other competitor schools may well offer huge financial incentives to the least financially deserving and we may well lose out on the wealthy elite - and yet there is real virtue within the scheme and for that it should be acclaimed.
I love the idea that a local thirteen year old of little wealth but enormous talent might benefit from Bedford’s sporting pedigree. This, I trust, is a party theme that is worth pursuing.
1.2.08
I suppose most of us involved in sport look forward with a degree of enthusiasm to the annual Six Nations Rugby Tournament. January and February are there to be endured and anything that lightens the gloom of these lack lustre months has to be welcomed.
And yet am I alone in believing that the reality of the event is so often so much less uplifting than the anticipation? After what was an exciting yet largely unenterprising 2007 World Cup, I can’t believe I am alone in surmising that the game of rugby itself is in need of a pretty drastic overhaul.
As school coaches we strive to instil in our players the ethos of fair play and sportsmanship and to encourage the implementation of an expansive and flowing style of play involving all fifteen players. What the boys witness on the national stage is a very different picture.
If we look back to 2003, nationally, with a hint of self-delusion and self-congratulation following the World Cup success, many believed Sir Clive Woodward’s self-fulfilled prophecies. His attention to detail was exemplary, his preparation meticulous and the results admirable. However, in the euphoria of success, two facts were largely overlooked.
Firstly the fact that England played better when they scrapped the style of play that Woodward professed to advocate and secondly that one player single handedly scored some 77 of the 97 points that England accumulated in the final rounds of the 2003 World Cup.
Even in 2003 England were never actually expansive nor adventurous. Far from promoting an uninhibited culture, the ‘any player in any position’ philosophy of Clive Woodward in actuality created a tediously structured and unimaginative style of play. It suited the mood and it suited the laws but it was not captivating.
What England were good at was using powerful forwards to pressurise the opposition into conceding penalties or drop goal opportunities which were converted by the metronomic Jonny Wilkinson. The perception, however, was different and the belief was that this multi-faceted-player philosophy was the secret to England’s success and should provide the way forward.
It would appear that a style of play has been spawned that has made present day English rugby stagnant and arguably unattractive to watch. Very average players, strengthened by hours of conditioning and by gallons of supplements can fulfil a role where their only real ambition is to seek contact and retain possession. The autumn round of Six Nation’s matches and the October World Cup that followed did little to suggest that English rugby has managed to shrug off these self imposed shackles.
This formatted style of play provides a template that is tempting to copy and simple to coach. It has become increasingly easy to evolve players with minimum skill but maximum bulk. Decision making is negated and big collisions are the number one priority.
It is unarguable that players are fitter and stronger and the hits are more compelling and destructive than was the case twenty years ago but is the product actually any more attractive to punters, or more importantly parents, whose off spring are thrown into the cauldron?
I have heard too that boys as young as fifteen are being advised by mentors to take performance-enhancing supplements and that some rugby academies are offering substances to them with a half price inducement. Advice on the downsides of taking such supplements doesn’t seem to be being proffered.
Rugby is arguably the ultimate team sport. Traditionally it tests all the physical qualities that humans might like to possess - speed, elusiveness, power, strength and cunning. It evolved in schools because it provided a stage for boys of all shapes and sizes. It disciplined the wayward, it tired the over exuberant and it occupied the masses. It was perfect for all shapes and sizes and most skill profiles. Each somatotype found his niche and the sport flourished.
If rugby is to retain its popularity as the most respected of team sports I believe it needs to ensure that it gets the product right. It must be seen as safe, clean, expansive, competitive and respectful of the laws that shape it.
It needs to encourage the media to condone fair play and condemn cheating. I would like to hope and believe that in their coverage of the 2008 Six Nations, BBC pundits will refrain from proffering such reflections as ‘You get away with what you can’ or ‘It’s a bit of something and nothing’ or ‘‘if you are going to put him off, put him off for good’. (Or more latterly that it’s defensible to kick a player because he’s French!).
In the relatively recently televised Bristol against Scarlets match BBC pundit Brian Moore expressed regret that the days when you could tread on a player in the course of rucking had gone. It is this sort of crass reflection, much favoured in clichéd after dinner speeches at Old Buffoonian Dinners, that does the game no favours.
To my mind rugby needs to withdraw from the collision culture, embrace the expansive game and adopt a stance against foul play. This will require the thorough examination of the laws that has been promised.
When some bright spark coach early in the 90’s perceived that if a player went to ground with the ball it would be incredibly hard for the opposition to wrestle it off him, the modern game evolved.
With nothing to be gained from entering the ruck, twenty-five players dutifully spread themselves across the field forming an almost impenetrable barrier that only a constant bombardment and subsequent weariness can breach. Wars of attrition have never been a captivating viewing.
I am sure schoolboy coaches would want young players to enter and enjoy a sport that withholds its traditional standards of fair play and one in which, literally ‘at the end of the day’, there is a fair chance that they will leave the field with limbs and mind intact. |
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