Good Practice Award Week 1

Each week I am going to have a Good Practice Award.

There will be no fancy presentations or trophies, the only privledge if you could call it that will be a slot on the Coaching and Games Blog. The award will be given out for examples of good practice that may come from within a club, a coach, a school etc. It's pretty broad but it will be given to something that catch's the eye. Hopefully others will pick up on the good practice and implement it.

The Award for Week 1 goes to: St. Mary's Primary School, Draperstown.

Every morning I drive past the school I am delighted with what I see. The school playground is awash with pupils. So is every playground I suppose, so why have I chosen St. Mary's for this award?

On closer inspection within their playground ladders,skipping ropes, hurdles, balance boards, volleyball nets etc are found scattered around and the children are going through them with much enjoyment. Every morning they are laid out in the same place, I am sure there is a playground supervisor mingling about, but there certainly isn't a coach or teacher organising the activity. I have recently heard Terence McWilliams mention a notion of "Free Play" I thought this was a pretty good example of it, where equipment was left out and the children devised their own games etc and played freely. The primary school coaches deployed around the County have school yard games and literature for teachers to use and implement at break and lunch times also.

In an age where children lead sedentary lifestyles and have a lack of fundamental movement skills this I feel is a great example of good practice.