Is this normal for prep (sports)

[FilltheWaterPot]

Immigrant from the State Sector here. DS has just gone into prep. They have three sports lessons a week totalling nearly 4 hours (double the time that they spend on Science). This includes changing time as well. Although the school is co-ed, the boys are completely separated from the girls for sport.

They have swimming once a fortnight, and the remaining five out of the six are all football. Is this usual? Although DS is very active, he really hates football, especially the weekly fixtures with other schools. I'm not so much criticising the time the school spends on sport, but I do wonder at the lack of variety. It's a long time to spend on an activity he really doesn't enjoy. Can anyone tell me if this is similar in other prep schools? I'm not sufficiently networked to know! Also, if anyone could tell me what goes on in state these days PE wise, I'd be appreciative of that as well.

Our experience is that the sport focus changes per term and is aligned with fixtures with other schools. Presumably the sports lessons are training sessions for the fixtures and an opportunity to select teams.

Ds has 4 hours sport on a Monday afternoon (no idea what they do in it, but it was def football this week!) then a different sport each day afterwards - rugby, netball, basketball, dance. Swimming is once a week. Have you spoken with school and asked? It might not be strictly accurate? Our sports timetable is seasonal too, so focus switches to cricket and rounders / hockey type things in spring term.

Yep, main sport changes according to season. Ds has 5 sports lessons each week:
1x swimming, 1x double games (football), 1x triple games (football, with fixtures each week), 1xsingle PE (not football) and 1x single games (football).

After half term, his single games lesson will be rugby training, in preparation for moving to rugby next term. Also hockey will start at some point, probably in the double games session.

The sport in focus changes by term. We had:

Girls: hockey, netball and football, cricket
boys: rugby, football, cricket

This is the same in our prep. This term football, then Rugby and Cricket in the summer term. The amount of sport is something that attracts many families.

Our prep does offer alternative sport from Y3 for those children who really don’t get on with the team fixtures. This is off-site and will be things like canoeing, climbing etc. Maybe see if yours does similar.

@TinaYouFatLard

Thank you - does the alternative sport take place whilst the others are doing football fixtures? I guess we'll have to stick out the football fixtures for some while before trying this route, but as there are too many boys anyway (so have to be substituted in/out so that they all get to play) there is a remote chance that school might agree in the long run.

Our prep moved towards offering the same sport to girls and boys along with rotation of sports each term (or half term, don't remember!) So if a girl/boy wanted to do what the other sec we're doing that term they could switch. So many girls took up cricket and boys took up hockey/netball. This was in 2017 so I assumed would be standard by now?

Dc were not offered alternatives until year 6. You may find cross country gets added into the mix during the winter. Swimming lesson was every week and coed as was pe indoors.

How old is your DS?

I have children in state school (infants) - they PE once a week. Indoors in winter mostly & outdoors in summer. The juniors have it twice a week. Each half term focuses on another sport. Football, hockey, cricket, netball, running, rounders & some athletics in summer. In the younger years, it’s more physical movement & dance etc. Our school dropped rugby entirely a couple years ago following a serious accident at the nearby high school that left a pupil unable to walk again. Several local schools did the same, citing of parents wished to continue to access rugby provision, they could do so at their own risk, not the schools. Fair enough I think! There are loads of after school rugby clubs available!

The school have competitive teams but these are coached after school, not during school time..

@FilltheWaterPot yes, during the longest lesson when the fixtures are played the children who do AS are taken off site to do their activities. As far as I know they still take part in the training sessions with the rest of the year group.

Thank you, there have been some really helpful responses on here. I know some of the mums of the girls are keen to have mixed-sex sports groups, as would I, especially as DS seems to have more friends among the girls than the boys.

I now feel encouraged to have a conversation with the Head about making some adjustments to the sports curriculum which might be to the benefit of everyone, even if it throws the Director of Sports into a tailspin. Sounds as though I am about to be that parent again!

To a certain extent it depends on what the other schools they compete against are doing and how elite they perceive themselves. If you are at year 3 the teams are pretty fluid as they want to identify potential first team players to be coached further and potential sports scholars. Before approaching anyone you may want to find out what happens further up the school.

@LIZS
Thank you for this advice. I will check this out.

I teach at a girls prep, this term they do netball, hockey, gym/dance and swimming. Same next term, summer term is rounders and athletics. Doing all one sport for 3 months does seem pretty dull, but apparently some of the schools we compete against do a term of hockey and a term of netball (so we thrash them in hockey this term and they thrash us at netball, by March it’s more equal!)

Offering other sports completely will probably only be an option at large schools. There’s no chance my school could do it due to cost and staffing.

It's standard to have one sport focus per term. They likely don't have the staff to offer an alternative. Sports absolutely shouldn't be co-Ed. It wouldn't be remotely fair on the girls.

The prep I work in they have an hour of sport four days a week the fifth day is matches with other schools home and away ...so at least 5 hours a week .
In the autumn term up to half term ..one of these lessons is swimming in our own pool plus in the summer term they also swim at least one a week

Unless there’s only about 20 in the year group you won’t be involved with fixtures - at least not all of them- if he hates it / is no good. I had a similar boy who turned out for the D team once in his entire school life!!

6 hours a week on PE/games at DD’s prep school. Plus extra fixtures if she’s selected for the ‘squad’. I don’t mind her doing lots of sport though, and she gets a variety of sports - although very little football!

We do 2/3 of a term on each sport: boys do football, rugby, hockey, cricket/tennis. Girls do hockey, netball, lacrosse and cricket/tennis. Those are "games" sessions. PE is mixed sex and they do a variety of different things but is always swimming in the summer term/first half of autumn term (outdoor pool). Approx 6 hours of sport a week in total, including inter school matches every week. All children play in all matches. Definitely part and parcel of an independent school - I remember well the hours spent in the rain on the hockey pitch from my own time at school!

It depends a lot on the school. My Year 3 has swimming every week for 2 terms and then athletics instead in the summer. The boys and girls play together until then end of Y3. This term they have 1hr of netball, next term it will be football and in the summer it’s cricket. They also have half an hour of dance and and hour of PE every week. So approx 4 hours if you include changing time. But it’s more varied than your timetable.
From Y4 the girls and boys are separated for sport, but there is more variety. This term the boys are playing football, badminton, cross country and swimming. Next term the football/badminton becomes hockey/basketball. Summer is cricket/tennis/athletics.
Year 3s only play a couple of matches - a full schedule doesn’t begin until Year 4. Any child who prefers to opt out of matches can do art/design instead.

Our prep does 3 games lessons and 1 PE lesson a week, plus fixtures.
The games lesson sport is seasonal so:
Boys- rugby, hockey, cricket/ tennis
Girls- hockey, netball, cricket/ tennis
In PE they do 4 rotations a term based on their preferences, but 1 compulsory rotation is swimming.
Boys & girls mixed choose from: badminton, basketball, lacrosse, rugby, football, gymnastics, trampolining
There are also additional extra-curricular sessions after school for certain sports

hmmm...lots of boys do a,b,c and girls do e,f,g. Why is it necessary for the sports to be gender based??? or is this a private school thing?

Our prep changes sport throughout the year. From year 3 they have games, PE and matches which is usually single sex (although they can the exceptions up to U11 which us in line with most contact sports), but they also have mixed in swimming, athletics and tennis. In addition they have swimming once a week and also once a week they have a co-curricular option which is mixed boys and girls and is either sporty or non-sport based.
In pre prep the sports are once a day and mixed bewteen boys and girls. All children have before and after school sports they can choose to do too.
However, as with most schools (state and private), the majority of boys tend to gravitate towards football at break times too. I think it's just one of those things.

I think it should be less about what the gravitate towards and more about equal opportunities. Many posters have noted that sports offered to boys are rugby, football and to girls netball, hockey etc. I don't get why they are different. Surely schools must offer same to both girls and boys?

Imo often schools are just set in their ways and don't consider what children want. Football is a pretty grim sport if you don't like it and have never got to grips with it. A decent % of boys hate it. A decent % of girls love it but hate netball or hockey.
Making them do so much of what they hate will not improve PE physical literacy skills at all. It may put people off for life.
Physical literacy is absolutely critical life skill.
Why pay for a school to fail a child for so many hours a week??
Segregating boys & girls is no different from the silly hideous girls uniforms they often insist on either.