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and Sportshall Athletics for their Coaches From England
by Roy Saxby,
Grimsby YMCA and Athletic Coach
It's great to get out surely you see,  Out with some friends and having some fun It really is great when you're out for a run. No matter the weather, sun, snow or rain You'll only get better if you continue to train.  So run with your body your heart and your mind It's pleasure and fun I'm sure you will find. Sometimes it's hard. "That's enough!" you will say, At the end of a session, a really tough day.  The next will be better just wait and see And again you'll be running alive and so free. So never give up where ever you are The finishing line is not really far.  We operate a programme called Sportshall Athletics throughout the cold, dark days of an English winter when over 30 primary schools, that's up to 10 year olds, compete against each other in four leagues. There are twenty four children from each school, 12 boys and 12 girls who will run, jump and throw inside a 33 metre long hall. Today in our final we had over 100 kids having a great time. This was during normal school hours. The shortest race is just 66 metres and the longest, our special marathon set out on a specially designed circular course with bends and chicanes is of ten laps which is about 700 metres. We have a variety of races either paired, relays or individual over a range of distances.We also have field events such as standing long jump, standing triple jump, vertical jump, high jump, soft javelin, speed bounce, seated ball throw, shot put and many other exciting events. The children really get excited when they visit us as do the adults but we soon discovered on their first visit during September we found that the children didn't know what to do so we devised a programme where the children learn the events during the summer prior to the start of our indoor season.  When they are in year 5 (9 coming on 10 years of age) they visit us at the YMCA and learn all the events but as well as learning how to jump throw and run they also have to do some maths, English and computer skills.The way this is carried out is they have to learn the event and mark and measure their own and their friends' achievements and input that information into a data base. Then when they get back to school they can create charts, graphs do comparisons from where they can start selecting their teams for the coming season. We also teach them how to use stop watches to become timekeepers, how to start races how to judge events and many other academic studies related to athletics.  The marking and measuring is carried out in a number of ways. The jumps mats (metro mats) are graduated in 1cm increments but the throws measuring mats are in 25cm increments so estimating is used. The high jump is as normal athletics and the soft javelin is measured using a 25 metre tape measure. We also use a surveyors wheel, or for the little ones a trundle measuring wheel.The programme has proved so successful that we received a national award for this work. We now have children from aged 6 years of age and upwards visiting us to carry out this type of number work but of course we have to modify the events and introduce new once that they are capable of doing like target ball, beanbag toss and other simple measuring and counting games. 
Being presented the runners up award for the Best New Initiative for Linking Education with Sport. Eamon Martin, former winner of the London Marathon, and Roy Saxby
We have made maths fun and enjoyable and of course healthy.
I hope that this is of interest to you and perhaps your site visitors.
Best wishes to all the visitors of KidsRunning.Com.
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KidsRunning.Com loves English 'maths'. It is full of developmental activities that encorporate art, graphing, creativity, writing , and exploration, but the real beauty of English 'maths' is that the activities drive kids to understand the structure behind the 'maths'. I'm getting my old Nuffield texts out from the 70's and using them in my classroom today!!!