From Wednesday October 25 to Friday October 27, students in Year 6 from schools in The Tunbridge Wells School Sports Partnership attended a Multi-Skills Academy at Angley School – A Sports College. Each primary school in the partnership was asked to invite one student who had been identified as gifted and talented in PE and Sport.

The theme was the baseball World Series which was taking place at the time and all cross-curricular activities focused on a striking and fielding theme.

Day One Activities

• Multi Skills Practical Session – students took part in 10 different striking and fielding related skills stations and recorded their scores
• Design your own game - in groups, the students were asked to design their own striking and fielding game using the equipment provided. They had to consider things such as safety, rules, space required and scoring systems.
• Geography – students were provided with Major League Baseball teams and were asked to identify which American State each team was located in and where on the map each state was located. They then completed a physical geography fact sheet on North America
• The day finished with a practical session on the Addison Arena; the group played cricket and then kickball.

Day Two Activities

• Multi Skills Practical Session – students repeated the circuit of activities from day one in an attempt to improve their scores
• Compare and Contrast Striking and Fielding Sports – students used their ICT skills to produce a table showing the difference between two different sports. They used the internet to research the rules of each sport.
• Numeracy – students analysed data from the Multi Skills circuit scores and had to work out the mean, median and mode scores and obtain data from different graphs.
• Again the day finished with a practical session outside. Students played Swedish long ball followed by rounders

Day Three Activities

• Baseball Coaching Session – Tom Gillespie (Baseball/Softball UK) ran a specialist coaching session focusing on catching with the gloves, pitching, fielding, hitting and how to play the game. This was a fantastic session and the game at the end was fantastic with many players standing out as future stars. Dave Radcliff and Margaret Borley (Tonbridge Bobcats) came along to talk about the local club scene and Sam and Jamie Radcliff (Junior GB Baseball Players) came along to show how it’s done and to share their experiences with the group
• Art and Design - students were asked to come up with their own team names and then design their own team logos or baseball strip
• The day ended with another practical session. The group played the games that they had designed themselves earlier on in the week.
• Presentations

Everyone received a certificate for their attendance on the course and a few additional prizes were awarded for exceptional work.

Multi Skills Stations – Best Improvement:

• Ben Bareham (St James Juniors)
• Toby Sinden (Goudhurst)

Best Geography Work:

• Jarrod Chapman (Lamberhurst)

Best Mathematics and ICT Work:

• Emily Ellis (Wittersham)

Best Poster Design:

• Camille Goddard (St James Juniors)

Everyone that attended was a credit to their school and they all produced some excellent work during the week. Many thanks to the TWSSP and Angley staff who ran the week along with sports leaders from Angley who assisted throughout the course. A huge thank you to Tom Gillespie for his inspiring baseball coaching session and to Margaret, Dave, Jamie and Sam for coming along to help promote the sport to the group.

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