To think schools should think more about the athletically challenged on Sports Day?

[BeeInYourBonnet]

It just seems like they are set up to fail, which makes them hate sport and sports day for the rest of their lives!

My DD is yet again in the sack race and skipping race.
A. She can't really skip so it will be a disaster.
B. The sack race is like some kind of medieval torture.

She was DESPERATE to be in the sprint or obstacle race, but apparently you have to rank top three in the practice to be in those races.

The sack race however is the 'didn't make the grade' race. It's a great idea isn't it? - let's take the least athletic, make them jump for 50m in a sack, with the almost 100% chance that they are going to end up face down in turf at some stage. That should motivate them.

I feel so sorry for DD, as shes been in tears. I just feel like saying to the school to just let her run, if she comes last she comes last, but at least she won't be traumatised (again) from getting caught up in a skipping rope or going arse over tit in a sack!

Are you telling me that I was put forward to do the sack race all those years ago because I wasn't sporty? Tell your daughter to put her feet in the corners and run. That's what we were taught and it meant that I won bronze in the county sack race (although to be fair that was mainly because someone in front of me fell over).

On the bright side I carried on with sport despite not being particularly good at it and now run half marathons.

To think schools should think more about the athletically challenged on Sports Day?

What - in the same way that schools think about the academically-challenged on every other day of the school year? Those children who really struggle with lessons, but might shine on Sports Day, just one day of the year when they might come into their own?

The two are not mutually exclusive though - being 'sporty' and being 'academic', that was the point I was trying to make previously. It's important that children aren't pigeonholed when they're at primary school. I can tell my 'academic' DS is a natural runner, he's even got the 'build' but he's already been put off that idea, prior to winning the sprint today and I don't think it's a helpful way to organise pupils.

Categorising at a young age is 'limiting' a child's potential. My DB was considered 'sporty' throughout school, captain of football teams, mostly really good at any sport he played and people would suggest he was the 'sporty' one and I was the 'studious' one so mostly I didn't bother with physical exercise which resulted in me being quite unfit as a teenager. Later in life I realised I'm quite competitive and took up tennis and was good at it. My DB was offered a place on an MA in Politics course at Oxford so despite lazy stereotypes, he obviously wasn't just 'sporty'.

Why isn't it called athletics day then??

We don't make those who can't do well in science or maths or languages humiliate themselves by doing badly in public - why should sport be different?

It's ever so slightly sadistic. Less of the "ever so slightly" KingJoffrey - it is thoroughly sadistic and very nasty.

Dancer but no other competitions are compulsory! There's no forced drama productions or creative writing competitions

I'm still dying slightly inside at Cardibach's post about every child singing a solo at the Eisteddfod.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooo! I would even try a sack race to get out of having to sing solo in public and my children would probably tie me up in the sack to avoid it too

Goldenbear that's a very good point. I'm actually a bit concerned that my middle ds has defined himself as a sporty non- academic type because he's got a lot of very intelligent friends and sports is what he can do better than them. I don't want him to think it's one or other.

Bollocks, Andrew!
Every single day in his school years, my son was made to feel inferior to his peers. He is Dyslexic and really struggled, and on occasion was made to feel completely inferior to his classmates.
On Sports Days, however, he shone.
One day a year - just one day.

The only good bit is a teachers' sack race and a parents' egg-and-spoon or three-legged race. Make the adults make tits of themselves for the amusement of the children!

No athletics at the Sports Days I had to sit through.

Evans Were your son's peers' parents invited to watch him struggle?

No?

Then why should the unsporty suffer that humiliation?

What happened to your son was appalling but it is no cure to mistreat other children at another time - even if it is one day a year.

Good grief Andrewofgg it's only some races. If my child felt publicly humiliated to the point where it might damage them emotionally by falling over in a sack race I'd be looking at the quality of my parenting and/or thinking about talking to someone about their self-esteem and mental health. I'm not talking about deliberately putting children with SEN into races that they can't complete, but for your average Joe, they should be fine. It's a lot more damaging to hear a parent being anxious about it, I'd have thought.

Sports Day at our school was fun, fun, fun.
Every single child was cheered on, and none of them felt badly, they all said they enjoyed those days and looked forward to them.

Sports don't just happen on sports day though, do they? Most children have at least 2 lessons every week. Sporty children have a chance to shine then too.

Oh for goodness sake, reading this thread its easy to see why kids are so bloody unresilient these days!

No that's true lashes but the difference is sport is important for health and fitness, if you don't do any drama or creative writing ever it won't affect your health, but not doing any exercise will.

Actually I think that Sport Day is crap. Thanksfully, ours is very much not competitive and more of 'having fun day'.

I have 2 dcs, both are doing well academically, one of them very very well. They are also very good at sports.
dc1 in particular is picked up for about every sport event AND any academic stuff going on. And yes he is also one of the 'serious' one so also get recognition for that too.
I found it to be a recurring theme tbh. The children who are doing well academically are often the ones who also have been taken to classes etc.. evry young, have some parents who are active and they are the ones who end up being 'good at sports'. Few of the 'good at sports' are struggling in class. And few of the good 'academically' really struggle at sports.....

but it is no cure to mistreat other children at another time

Mistreat - really??

And a sure fire way to ensure that doing regular exercise DOESNT happen into adulthood, is to fail to engage children at a young age. And to label them unsporty, rather than try to find sports they can enjoy.

My DH was crap at sports in school, had a negative view of himself as unsporty, and as a result didn't carry on exercising into adulthood. It's only when he got into his late twenties and took up a few nontraditional (ie not taught in school) sports that he found his niche, and he's now one of the fittest people I know.

Dancer but sports day is one day it won't make any difference to that

The trouble is that to many of the children concerned the humiliation is more important than the races. A simple race is one thing, sure, somebody will come last, but sack races and skipping races and such things will leave some children not only last but looking like shit. No school should make a pupil a laughing-stock in public. Yes, it will happen in class sometimes, that's life and children will be cruel - but don't let it happen in public with parents looking on and sometimes joining in.

maman I have seen the same re 'high achievers'.

I stand by mistreat - inflicting public humiliation is mistreatment.

"No, but every single day they're at school, they feel it."

As do the less sporty kids every single PE lesson. When you are picked last and then they argue the toss over it saying "oh no its your turn we had to have Helena on our team last time arguing this back and forth.