Sports day!!!

[autumngirl714]

At my child’s school, Sports Day is split into two parts. Part 1 is great—an obstacle course where everyone takes part in their team colours, and each team earns points. But Part 2 is where I feel a bit torn. It’s competitive racing and field events, but only the best from each team colour get picked—fastest runners, longest jumpers, etc. The rest of the kids just sit and watch.

Every year, the same sporty kids get chosen, and my daughter —who tries really hard but isn’t the fastest—never gets picked. She's started to really dread Sports Day now and feels like no matter how much effort she puts in, it’s not enough. It’s heartbreaking to watch.

I do understand the argument that this gives athletic kids a chance to shine, and I don’t want to take that away—but I can’t help but feel it’s unfair and disheartening for the rest. Wouldn’t it be better to include more children in Part 2, or offer additional fun races so that everyone gets a turn?

Just been to sports day today where the same girl got picked to do every single competitive race meaning nobody else got chance. She gets picked every single year which is great for her, but not fair on others.

What do you think? Aibu?

At my primary and my daughters primary they only do 80m, 200m, and 4 x 100m relay. And then fun races like skipping, egg and spoon etc. At secondary we got to pick 3 events - I did 100m, 200m, and the relay. But I did also do well at longer distances in PE lessons, long jump etc. Being tall with strong long legs gives advantages in both track and field.
I wasn't very good at shotput though.

We have these threads year after year. In school productions, the better performers will get the bigger roles and the other children will have small roles. For STEM events, the teachers will pick the children who are gifted and talented to go out for a bit of fun for the day while the others stay behind. Why can’t the children who are good at sport be allowed to shine?

Watching something he's interested in is very different to watching kids run for 90 minutes. Watching a film is also supposed to be passive for a long period of time, sports day isn't.

…… is this not common? There are competitions eg the kangaroo maths challenge i think it is where only the best from each school are selected. Ditto olympiads which are common at a level where the best from each school are selected. Why cant we celebrate children who are the best at something?

I've never heard of it.

Sports day is also about supporting and celebrating others rather than being directly involved the whole time. I'm sure he wouldn't have to sit motionless in silence if he's watching other kids compete, surely he'd be cheering and supporting his friends or the children in his team or class?

For some of the time, of course. 90 minutes is overkill though.

2 things.
I used to teach a lovely athletics program to Y6. At each skill/event a child would compete against him/herself to improve their score.
Scores were recorded so the children in each group just naturally competed with each other too. It's what they do.
Secondly, in your sports day scenario non-competitors should be supporting and encouraging their house /team and getting enjoyment from that.

Yep there are loafs of different competitions. Off top of my head DD1's school (small state junior school) has this year done

• football festival
• a drama competition
• a singing event with lots if other schools
• a debating competition
• a netball festival
• an interschools athletic competition
• a netball festival
• a coding event with other schools
• a county gymnastics competition

There are more, but can't recall all of then. They make every child gets to go to at least one of these every year. It's very standard, I thought. Its to broaden opportunities and give chance to interact with a wider variety of children, as well as pride of representing the school

Our school does it the same way as you OP. Except the race part isn’t that long. It includes a relay race (so 4 boys and 4 girls from each house get to participate, 32 kids is a good chunk of the year), and also one race, the long distance race, is for anyone who wants to join in. So it’s only a few races where the top few get chosen.
I doubt the school would be keen on suggestions for a complete overhaul of sports day but they might be open to the suggestion of adding in one race for anyone that wants to join in?

Watching sport is a fairly mainstream leisure activity, isn’t it? How do poeple watching a football or rugby match manage? Or Wimbledon? Or the Olympics? Or 5 days of a test match?

So no kids ever attend football or rugby matches? Same timescale

Sporty kids should get their day, especially as they are often not the academic kids, but there are definitely better ways to do it.

I was impressed at my son's first PE day as the teacher had obviously pre planned the groups after the practice races and every race was pretty evenly matched, so the fast kids were in competition with each other and the slow ones weren't left meters behind the others, feeling like they were awful. Gold star from me for that!

However that teacher left and it's now a free for all 🤣 But that's the way to do it for the best of everyone I think.

...without expecting to join in!

Well, yes…
Same as sports day then? By the day everyone knows who is doing which events.
Not sure what your point is here really.

In what way did your DD work hard, on the day she ran as fast as she could or practiced/trained in advance? These are very different things.

The thing about sport is its under her control, if she wants to get faster, she can do more running. You don't need the long winded consolation talk that maybe she shines in other areas, you can show her that she has the power to do better. Is there a junior parkrun near you, as a start? She can be happy getting a PB there, seeing her progress.

It was a response to a previous post that was saying sports day should be all about doing the activities, not spectating.
Nobody goes to a football match and complains they had to just sit and watch instead of joining in.

I think it sounds like a good compromise and from my experience is a similarly planned event when compared with other primary schools. First half team races and second half individual track and field events.
But I don't think one child should do more than one race. If a child is a talented runner then great they should get a chance to shine but perhaps in one race, giving others a chance to also shine in other races. I think one child doing all the races in their class/year group is a bit much. Hopefully there'll be enough parents giving feedback so that some changes can be made.
That said, sports days is a massive headache for schools (former teacher) who never seem to get it all right - there are always parents complaining about some organisational bit or another. There could be an equal number of parents of talented sporty children who would complain that their child was only allowed to do one race. There is always someone who never wins at sports day and that's the school!

If it is something they are interested in, of course.

90 mins is nothing. Even completely bored it’s nothing. But a child sitting with friends and supporting school mates, cheering them on etc shouldn’t be bored. When did attention spans get so small? If it was 2 days I might have some sympathy.

My child would be, not right away but definitely coming up to 90 minutes of doing nothing but sitting and watching.

Though to be fair, that is what all sports day would be for him since at his school it is all about running and he can't run. It's a reason why he won't be in on sports day and we're going out for the day instead.

You keep refusing to accept he doesn’t have to ‘do nothing’. He can chat to friends and cheer on the runners. Nobody is making him sit in silence doing nothing.

That sounds like a proper miserable day. Just running and the kids sitting and watching.
No cheering, no other sports, no teachers playing the houses against each other (lightheartedly), no singing, no picnic lunch, no mega phone announcing the winners, no learning about congratulating winners or boosting those who are disappointed.

Because people choose and want to watch in the first place. Plenty of people also choose not to.

If it wasn’t for going to support my child, I wouldn’t go to Sports Day at all.

He doesn't want to just sit there when he isn't able to take part and I don't blame him so he won't be.