The School Run

I heard this phrase listening to Eddie Jones' book - 'Leadership - Lessons from my life in rugby'.

It is the main topic this week and I will be unpacking what this means and how Eddie Jones described it, relating it to Christiano Ronaldo, Kevin Pietersen, and Shane Warne.  How players and children sometimes would rather look good and demonstrate skills rather than the character to be successful within a team environment or individual sport. 

As always, I bring this back to children and what implications it has for parents, coaches, and teachers.

The second section is focussing on opportunities and barriers that might exist, and prevent children from taking part in physical activity opportunities.  In my mind, I believe we need to do more to remove barriers to do all we can to help children and families be more active.

I also look at how negative news is more profitable and how dangerous this is for young people going into the world of social media.  Having listened to Johan Hari, it is easy to see just how damaging social media can be if measures are not put into place to stop companies like Facebook from making money from people's attention on negative news, and the amount of time they spend online.  

Finally, a bit of a moan on an experience I had this week. Do people actually want to work?

I hope you enjoy this week's episode.  If you liked it, please bring a friend along next week, it would really mean a lot.  Have an awesome week and don't get sucked in by negative news.

When speaking to my business partner earlier in the week, he said "children's fitness levels are on the floor", this stuck with me and I wanted to discuss it in this week's episode.  He was covering a year 6 lesson and was shocked that the children couldn't even jog across the length of a netball court without stopping. That's only 30 meters!!

In the second part of the episode, I'll take this further and talk about why I believe it is important to be active, children, schools, and families.  It is pretty obvious and clear, but it needs saying and as always I bring it back to fun, which for me is the most important aspect of raising physical activity levels in children, but also across the board.

The final discussion point is around strengths and weaknesses.  Leaning into strengths but looking to improve those areas we know are not our best.  This is important for parents as well, sometimes it is too easy to let our children focus on strengths, but neglect their weaknesses.  Don't. They will thank you for this later in life, I hope......

If you want to jump to different topics, below are the timings:

0:53 - Children's fitness levels are on the floor

12:41 - Why it is important everyone is active

22:21 - Leaning into your strengths and improve your weaknesss

Enjoy the episode.

Happy New Year everyone and welcome to a bit of a summary episode of the 'The School Run Podcast'.

I recently watched Russell Howard's Lubricant show and there was a section in it that really struck a chord with me, it was about moments and memories and how they should be cherished and that they are far more important than a selfie.

I also take a look back at the episodes from 2021 and what the podcast will have in store for 2022.  What would you like to hear?  What did you like, not like? Let me know and I will use this to shape future episodes.

There are likely to be more solo episodes which I feel will make the podcast more sustainable over the long term, but if you want your voice heard, or someone you know would be a great guest, please drop me a message. 

You can do this on any of the socials, or just over email. [email protected] 

I look forward to hearing from you and here's to creating more memories in 2022.

Nicole nearly lost her life through her pregnancy and having sepsis. She still has PTSD from the ordeal and nightmares which must be so tough, and I could not begin to understand.

The takeaway for me is the way she has come back from this, and the role that sport has played.  It was able to take her away from her own mind and solely concentrate on her cricket, a 30-minute net session became a 3 hour one and she was able to find herself again.

It is easy to underestimate what sport can do, and not just from an elite level perspective, but from a participation level, it can give us so, so much.

Every child should have the opportunity to experience the joy that sport can bring. 😁

This was just one of many things we discussed, but certainly, one that stood out.

The 2005 Ashes was an AMAZING summer, I loved that England cricket team, and Kevin Pietersen became a national hero as we took it to the Aussies for the first time in my life at that point.  Mark describes an innings in New Zealand, where KP got out quite cheaply, but more frustratingly for him was the manner of the innings, he let Scott Styris bowl at him, without taking the attack to him as he had done so many times in the past.  He sat on the balcony with Mark and they decided that he couldn't allow Scott Styris bowl at him like that again.  3 months into practicing a new shot, he faced Scott Styris again in an ODI, in England and the first and 3rd ball he faced from Styris, he 'Reverse hit' for 6.  And, changed the game of cricket forever!

I love stories like this so much.  We only ever see the result, I had no idea it had taken that long for him to perfect the shot.  We often think of these superhumans, that have so much talent, that it is easy for them.  But actually, the reality is one of hard graft and 1000's of hours of practice, setbacks, tweaking, and honing their craft.

My point is, if you want something, go and get it. But be prepared to work hard to achieve your goals, no one is going to give it to you, but opportunities are everywhere for the taking, don't give up.

Mark is a wonderful coach and I certainly learned so much from this conversation.  With Mark being based down the road, I'm hoping our paths will cross again in the future and I can learn some more gems from him

James' passion and commitment to his work are very clear in this episode and actually, he shares many of the same values and beliefs we do at Inspired Schools.

He talked passionately about the health of the nation and how he believes we need to do more at the root of the problem, invest in our children, into getting them more active, and relieve the burden on the NHS and the crazy amount of money that is spent on obesity-related illnesses.

James is a grafter, he works so hard in his job and provides opportunities for many athletes at his running club in the evenings.  As you will hear, I joked that he has some time to squeeze more in...!  I sometimes get concerned with work-life balance, but James has brought his children into his working life and it sounds as though they are reaping the benefits of this.  They are around this environment, this high-performance environment and I know that his children will develop their personal skill set along with developing a healthy and active lifestyle. Inspired by their Dad.

James has inspired me to look into starting a running club in my local town, giving FREE opportunities to children in the Bridgwater to be active and be a part of a community where being active is celebrated.

What could you do?

If you want to find out more about James and what he does, please go to:

http://www.teamthie.com

Enthusiasm, passion, drive, determination, infectious, fun.

I felt all of this after speaking with Alex for the School Run Podcast.  When speaking to someone with such passion for what they do, it always make me think, 'could we be doing more'.  Everyone that works with children, whether you are a teacher, coach, volunteer, teaching assistant, or lunchtime supervisor, can all make a huge difference.  Everyone that I have spoken to can almost instantly remember someone that impacted their childhood and I think we impact young people more than we realise.  This can be coaching or teaching, or simply by supporting and being there for someone. Just give it 100% and be there for the children in your care.

Learning more from your losses isn't something new to 'The School Run Podcast', but it is worth mentioning again as it is so important.  Creating environments where children are able to express themselves, without fear of failing, they should feel comfortable to try new things, be creative and solve problems on their own.  Then if they make a mistake or get an answer wrong, they will be willing to give it another go, to keep trying until they do get it right and this is so powerful.  Even more so if we encourage problem solving, and let children work out their own solutions, they become problem solvers and will start to take ownership over their mistakes.

I loved this episode and I hope you will as well.

I love speaking to Sue, I’ve only met her 3 times, twice on Zoom and once in person.  I always feel motivated and enthused after our conversations, but more so it always reaffirms that we are on the right track with what we are doing as a business.

We talked about so much in this episode, legacy, how Pe has changed over the years, but how it still remains so important in our eyes and much more.  It is our job to help schools realise the power of raising the profile of PE, physical activity and sport can have, if it’s put up there with Maths and English.

Sue talked about a school in Wakefield where parents can book to go into the school and watch any lesson.  How cool is that?  On last week’s episode I talked about the journey back to human, and this is an amazing way to start doing this.  Bringing the community together in relation to sport and festivals, which I think is the easiest way to involve parents.  I think that schools can celebrate this more than they do, bring the community in to watch the wonderful things that are going ahead (thinking non-covid times here, but still possible outdoors).  We typically make quite a big deal of sports days; I am a big advocate of having an inclusive sports day AND a traditional competitive one.  If you embed festivals and competitions throughout the year, bring the community in and it will bring a huge amount of pride and enthusiasm into the school and the most important thing is that children will LOVE it. Plus, parents might see their children thrive in a different environment which they didn’t know they loved.

The power of community.

Take a look at the resources section of the AfPE website, there is so much in there to support you in your PE journey.

https://www.afpe.org.uk/physical-education/#

This was a thinker of an episode, certainly for me.

It has made me evaluate our business practice and actually, I think we can improve what we are delivering into schools instantly. I am confident we deliver an excellent service into our primary schools, but I think by planning in leadership opportunities and other soft skills into, we can be even better.

I believe that through PE, sport and physical activity we have a unique opportunity to inspire children to be active and help them find something they love.  But more than this we can give them skills such as leadership, resilience, creativity, teamwork etc, that will benefit them in later life, when going for jobs, managing people and communicating with peers and adults.

I really enjoyed the documentary film 'Steeler', I found it thought provoking and I would recommend giving it a watch.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Steelers-Worlds-First-Rugby-Club/dp/B092C28G8Z 

Bottom line - sport and physical activity can be transformative, we need to do all we can so that more children can experience this.

When out running listening to Steven Bartlett's book 'Happy Sexy Millionnaire', I was inspired to record this episode to review and give my thoughts on one of the chapters 'The Journey Back to Human'.

In this episode I take a look at some quotes from Steven's book about "Silicon Valley taking the life out of our lives" and how "18-37 year olds are the loneliest generation in human history".  I review this and give my take, relating it to PE, Sport and Physical Activity and how these three things can have a huge impact on our journey back to human, the importance of human interaction and the relationships that can be forged through sport.

Have a think back to the most enjoyable parts of your life... For me, one was playing on the school playground with my friends, playing football, cricket, tag, 1,2,3 in and even street hockey at times.  Anything active, as long as we were together.  Amazing times.  We need to cherish these moments and schools should be putting PE right up there with English and Maths, because it will have a huge impact on the lives of young people and start our journeys back to human.

I hope you enjoy the episode.  The links to Steven's book and podcast are below.  Hell, my book link is below as well, but get Steven's first!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Happy-Sexy-Millionaire-Unexpected-Fulfilment/dp/B08666P6FK/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=steven+bartlett&qid=1636838522&sr=8-1

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-diary-of-a-ceo-with-steven-bartlett/id1291423644

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Healthy-Happy-School-performance-integrating-ebook/dp/B093ZSMW8R/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=ben+kirk&qid=1636839023&sr=8-1

Enjoy.