Secondary School Teachers- how do you get to them.

[Barny of Blandford]

I think RJ and Oldman are missing the point - you do not stay in teaching if you do not like it - we are trying to point out that you are expecting miracles

To be positive - if I have a young lad or lass wanting to do cross country or athletics I give them a sheet from Poole Runners ( or Wimborne or Bournemouth) and send them down to friends of mine who coach there. They will be coached on Tuesdays and Saturdays every week by qualified coaches who are CRB checked and the club is certified with its Clubmark. They will have regular competitions for juniors appropriate to the standard and age against other organised and like minded clubs in the area of Dorset/Hampshire and eventually Wessex when they get a bit better.
The same happens for rugby, cricket, netball, volleyball and gymnastics - all of which we have strong local links. They are the ACTIVE sports in our area of Dorset.
Because these clubs have qualified coaches, organise regular coaching and competitions and have Clubmark they receive regular funding from Sport England to further finance this work.
We teach Orienteering at school to Years 9 and 10.
However we do not have a suitable club in this area (including my own) that offers weekly training, qualified coaches, weekly local competitions and is a recognised club that will attract funding. We just do not have that sort of a set up in Orienteering unfortunately - at least not in this area.

In the 70s and 80s the major sports moaned like stink that schools were not producing their cannon fodder like they used to. So they set up Development Officers, started things like mini-rugby, junior leagues, regular club coaching/training and so on - much of this starting at age 8. They also looked at ways of making the sports more attractive to youngsters - such as 20-20 cricket recently
At present we are running down RDO,s, moaning about different types of orienteering such as micro and sprint, wearing kit that looks as though it is out of the ark and generally complaining about not getting moneys worth if a race is not classic or a relay is to short.
Perhaps we need to look positively at what some sports have done to attract youngsters and then work out how we change out sport - otherwise in another 20 years it will not exist
Ps at 60 I am about to do my coaching course as I have decided that even my orienteering skills after 33 years of PE teaching could perhaps have an updating - so I hope that I can be positive

[Red Adder]

Does BOF / Regions / Clubs have any info as to the initial contact to the sport of existing members ? Past trends may not be a great indicator of best future audiences but may help. I was infected with the O bug at Uni, but I don't know if many have clubs at present, judging by the list on BOFs club page not many do, and several of those did not seem too active. Perhaps clubs should try and establish contact with local Unis ?

About 10-15 years ago I remember concerns about over-subscribed events - 5000+ JK entries, talk of having to deliberatley put on 2 or 3 events on around London simultaneously to meet demand but sadly in another 10-15 years time there may be very little of the sport left if we can't attract and retain people that compete 21 age group, and have not replenished the current 45-60 cohort who are still doing much of the voluntary work needed to run events and the clubs in general.

[RJ]

Yes Barny you are quite correct.... exactly what I was saying. You have to conduct your school events on THE SCHOOLS TERMS, or at least do things that teachers are used to, and within a framework that teachers understand and have a respect for. I don't think you can just send a handout into schools and expect the PE staff to act on it.

Teachers will not recommend something to kids that they don't have complete confidence in. The last thing they will want is kids coming back and saying that was crap!

We really have been trying to meet these concerns head on by creating an event structure using school grounds. Over the years the teachers have bought into the series because the kids have been buzzing after their orienteering experience. 250 kids after school using SI.... they love it!

Now the challenge is to convince the kids to join in with other club activities. But now PE staff, and of course our RDOs and ourselves are all taking school-club links. We will get there! Yes the take up is a trickle to date.... but now everyone is using the same hymn sheet!

Just imagine someone comes to you (as a teacher) wishing to promote lacross. You know something about the sport but have you enough confidence to sell it convincingly to your class of 14 year olds? Orienteering is a minority sport.... just don't assume that PE staff understand it the way you do. The way to get to the secondary school PE staff is to work within THEIR SYSTEM. Our RDOs know all about how to do it.

[guest]

RJ - thanks for such a positive endorsement of how to get school children excited by orienteering racing. BOF has just produced guidelines for the new School Competition Managers (only a pilot in 20 School Sport Partnerships at the moment but who knows where it will lead) which shows them how to introduce simple competitions on school grounds which will be fun and exciting racing.

I am optimistic, like you, that children and their families will come into clubs IF clubs put on local events and publicise these events.

Our RDOs are there to help clubs to make the links with the schools through the PDMs (Partnership Development Managers) and the SSCos (School Sports Co-ordinators) to their clusters of schools.

[Mrs H.]

yawn!

I am optimistic, like you, that children and their families will come into clubs IF clubs put on local events and publicise these events.

quite - so why bother with the schools?

[RJ]

yawn!

Mrs H..... there are dozens of people working with and working in schools around the country at the present time.... trying to introduce 'O' to kids.

You can not tell them that they are wasting their time. That is extremely rude.

Normally I would consider a posting like this to be inappropriate.... but in this case you are not following the 'understood polite netiquete' that should be used. Ill-mannered postings are inappropriate.

It is such a pity that you tarnish your otherwise very valuable contributions to the various debates.

[Gross]

You can not tell them that they are wasting their time.

Think Mrs H has already done that. Maybe RJ meant she shouldn't

[Stodgetta]

A point that hasn't been made about O in schools is that if it is done properly, at least children will know what orienteering really is.
If they don't jump straight into the sport now it may be something they decide to take up at Freshers Fair at uni for example, or try at a later date, but they won't be tromping round the hills with rucsacs on at the weekend and telling all their friends on Monday that they were orienteering.
Parents do need to be involved if the kids are going to take up the sport, and I'm involved (via Peter Christopher) with schools development through the PDM's at 2 local specialist sports schools plus all their feeder primaries. There are more level 1/2 coaches in our local primary schools than there are in our club and there are hundreds of local kids o-ing at school. We are starting to get a trickle into the sport from that, now, after 12 months work, but Peter is now basically co-ordinating things, and the schools are running themselves. I dare anyonr to tell Peter he's wasted his time!
We are also running monthly events for absolute beginners aimed at runners/families/anybody, with a high uptake of membership. A fair proportion of these are people who orienteered once or twice when they were younger, saw the event advertised and thought they'd have another go now. For us as a club, these 20 and 30 somethings can be more valuable than juniors in a way - they aren't going to go to university and leave the club in 10 years time!
For me, the value of schools O is not to current club membership, but looking ahead to the future.

[RJ]

There are more level 1/2 coaches in our local primary schools than there are in our club.....

I think this is quite widespread around the country. I find it amazing that so many teachers are prepared to do the 15 hours at a two day course to get an 'O' accreditation. They then go back into their school and set up after school clubs etc. Why not choose another sport... why orienteering. There is obviously something about our sport that is appealing and attracive.... we know what it is, but it is good to see that others do also.

BOF and the RDOs have worked hard to get all this in place. Now.... is it possible to let the local clubs know who these teachers are, which schools they work in, and how/what the club can offer to them?

[Mrs H.]

RJ - i have not been abusive or profane but have expressed a robust opinion which does not happen to be to you taste. please stop censuring me.

I accept that if you are after something other than recruiting people to your club (ie D of E, PE GCSE - general awareness of what orienteering is) then work is schools may have a function of some sorts.

We have just heard from a string of teachers who say they don't want to know or get involved. I was able to organise a school team from the club outwards for a weekend away at the BSOC- the PE teacher failed to get a team 10 minutes down the road. which of us would you say had been the most successful in bringing orienteering to schools children.

Oh and by the way - would you like to tell me a netquettely correct way of saying i think schools development work is a waste of time?

ps - at no time in the last 6 months has our RDO (who is a very nice lady but know nope-all about orienteering) been of any assistance to me in any department whatsoever. I on the other hand have assisted her. I was also stopped by another RDO - DURING MY COMPETATIVE RUN - and asked to explain MADO to her!

Do you wonder why I'm so sceptical?

[Gross]

(who is a very nice lady but know nope-all about orienteering)

Maybe that's because BOF was run by someone who knew nope all about orienteering! Wonder is it's changing?????

[PorkyFatBoy]

As I see it the problem with schools O is this - it's all very well to put on an event in their grounds - even a very good one - but if they want to try it outside of school they need transport, which means mummy and/or daddy has to take them there. This must also be fitted in around other siblings activities and or existing sporting commitments. By targeting the parents and presenting it as a sport for all the family, this solves the transport problem as the parents will be there too.

From my own experience of schools O, where we met at school early on Sunday mornings and bundled off in the minibus all over the West Midlands, the bigger challenge was getting my dad to drop me off (school was about 10 miles from home) and pick me up afterwards.

The O club at school seemed to have floundered some time after I left (although the teacher who started it is still there, he no longer competes) and was restarted when Mr Barable joined the school.

So there you have it. After 24 years of O in my senior school, you have two "orienteers" - Me and Eddie - I took a twenty year break.

[HOCOLITE]

There is one other a young lady known to Eddie, she still occassionally O's but was rather put off when she went to an 'elite O Uni'

[John Morris]

Just found, and speed-read (erm, well, skipped through) this thread.

Lots of sense from Barny...

Lots of rather missionary stuff from others, it seems to me.

Missionaries, always in pairs, turn up at our front door from time to time.

They say: have you considered the existence of God?

I say: Yes, that's why I'm an agnostic. Is there anything else I can help you with?

And at this point, the experienced ones move on...


The point being that you can't expect others to accept your message, or even be grateful for being allowed to hear it, unless you are supplying something they think they want.

Teachers in this thread have said, loud and clear: we're not here to boost BOF membership. Barny of B... has said explicitly that he will only point yougsters in the direction of clubs/sports that have a good chance of delivering what the youngsters want.

Perhaps the best we can do is to put on offer as much tempting fare as our own enthusiasm/generosity allows (RJ is a case in point?) and then wait to see if anyone's interested. If they're not, they're not. No blame attaches to them, be they teachers, children or parents.

If you feel that your efforts are ill-rewarded, find something else to do, something you'll find more rewarding irrespective of whether anybody else notices.

Personally, I'm off to reload the bird table with Ernest Charles' finest seed. And I've never yet seen a grateful starling...

[SeanC]

Mrs H. You might find this a bit boring

Hocolite wrote

"Sean C. Your premise about safety etc doesn't hold up for our experience as the primary schools have flocked in."

Before I go on... I should say that I used to be a Geography teacher in a secondary school.

Perhaps I made the point about the safety too black and white. What I should have said in the previous post is that the safety issue adds stress to the teacher and is one reason why they might not get back to Hocolite. Although taking kids to the local park to do orienteering should be a completely safe activity, unfortunately a minority of children behave badly and put themselves at risk. Also in many secondaries staff are often given limited information about their pupils, I've been in situations where I've not received paperwork informing me that a child was an asthmatic or even a former victim of child abuse. When you are taking kids out of school, you are on your own, if something goes wrong it's down to you. Because kids do not stay with one teacher in a secondary, teachers do not get the chance to know the pupils in the same way as a primary school. If something goes wrong, however unlikely, the teacher will have to live with the fact that somebody elses child was hurt in their care. If the fault was with the child, or with the schools communication system, this will be little consolation to anyone involved.

On a more positive note, many secondary teachers understand the educational and social value of outside school activities and really do want to see children do this kind of thing.

I wrote

"I'll ask my wife (non-orienteering, experienced PE teacher in inner city comp) for her opinions this weekend and post something up if I think it's useful. "

I'll have to do this in two parts as I'm running out of lunchtime!

I talked to my wife about this. Basically secondary PE teachers are still expected to do extra-curricular activities, but normally in lunchtime or after schools. It's becoming less and less common for PE teachers to do extra-curricular on saturdays or sundays (reasons, see Barney of Blandford's post). Another issue, at least in her school, is that its becoming more difficult to keep the extra-curricular activities going as children become less sports orientated, particularly girls. Hence PE teachers tend to avoid minority sports like orienteering where it can be impossible to maintain sufficient interest.

The general trend is that as the demands of the job have increased, non-PE teachers have become less likely to run extra-curricular activites. However things vary greately between secondaries. Some secondaries make it a virtual pre-condition of getting a job at their school that staff offer extra-curricular activities. Also some schools are beginning to pay part time staff to run extra-curricular activities that would have been run by teachers in the past.

She rates the concept of SSCO's (Schools Sports Co-ordinators). These people's job are just to help develop sports in the feeder primary schools. Unlike a lot of government initiatives, this one is backed by real money. The SSCO in her school works 3 days a week (normally this sort of initiative gets 1 or 2 hours time per week). Unfortunately their SSCO isn't very good and no-one knows what he does This is definately down to the individual concerned and not the scheme.

We came up with some ideas re school orienteering and outdoor ed centres. But I'll have to post these tomorrow, am out of lunctime.