Change4Life Sports Clubs is an exciting new programme aiming to harness the inspiration of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. It encourages less active primary and secondary aged school children to do more physical activity and engage in sport.
Change4Life Sports Club Challenge
During 2012's amazing summer of sport, we're asking teams of young leaders and volunteers to take the Change4Life Sports Club Challenge in secondary schools.
This involves planning and staging a celebration event, aiming to inspire and motivate others to get involved by bringing to life the achievements of each Change4Life Sports Club and the young people in them.
We've created an online tool to help, containing videos, downloads, templates and ideas to make the events exciting, and the chance to win prizes for their school by telling us what they've done.
You'll be able to find more information on the bright yellow wristbands sent out to secondary schools.
Start your Change4Life Sports Club Challenge!
Encouraging children and young people to be more active through sport
There are 3,000 existing Change4Life Sports Clubs in secondary schools and 4,500 primary clubs started in January 2012. The clubs have been funded by the Department of Health. They are starting to have a significant impact in engaging children and young people in sport and physical activity and changing attitudes towards being active.
What are Change4Life Sports Clubs?
Change4Life Sport Clubs are targeted at the current gap in provision between fundamental movement skill development at age 4-7 and sport-specific skill development at age 9–11.
They take the principles and specific skills from a range of Olympic and Paralympic sports and place them in a fun, vibrant and exciting activity club.
Primary clubs
Primary clubs capture the essence of the sport without directly delivering sport-specific content, and are grouped under three multi-sport themes:
- Adventure: canoeing, cycling, orienteering, rowing, sailing
- Creative: cheerleading, dance, diving, gymnastics, skipping, swimming, trampolining
- Target: archery, boccia, bowls, fencing, goalball, golf
Secondary clubs
Secondary clubs are sport-specific and are designed around a need to increase the opportunities for young people to participate in these sports using the school as the club host. The sports involved are:
Why are they needed?
Change4Life Sports Clubs are designed to increase physical activity levels in less active children in schools through the development of a new type of sports club.
They aim to create an exciting and inspirational environment to engage these young people in school sport. With so many barriers to children and young people being active, from social to physical, it’s important to make physical activity a habit if we’re to reduce the likelihood of in chronic disease in later life.
Who are they for?
Change4Life Sports Clubs aim to increase participation in sport and physical activity by less active children. Nationally, ‘less active’ tends to refer to children who do not undertake the recommended daily minimum of 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous intensity physical activity.
While these are national recommendations, it’s important to identify the less active children in your school. These children will be doing significantly less physical activity for a variety of reasons. Overcoming these barriers starts by really understanding what children think and want.
What are the benefits?
Healthy pupils are more likely to be effective learners. PE and sport are fundamental to the development of children and young people’s health and wellbeing, and their ability to lead healthy, active lifestyles.
Change4Life Sports Clubs can:
- Increase attendance
- Improve behaviour
- Increase confidence
- Increase sense of belonging
- Raise aspirations
- Develop life / employability skills
- Support cross-curricular learning
- Increase knowledge of healthy lifestyles
- Create wider support for learning
Sport is also a powerful way to develop pupils’ wider skills, qualities and aspirations as participants, leaders and organisers, which improve the overall school environment.
How do they relate to other school sport initiatives?
Change4Life Sports Clubs are more than just after-school activity because they aim to provide an accessible introductory club experience on-site in schools. This means they are owned and managed by the school, are unique in the way they are delivered and are driven by the needs of young people.
The clubs have been designed to give children the necessary skills and confidence to be able to take part in School Games opportunities and become comfortable with competing in their school or against other schools. It’s important that the mentor and deliverer of the club understand all that School Games has to offer and how Change4Life Sports Clubs can be a great introduction to this.
How do I get involved?
The initial allocation of secondary and primary Change4Life Sports Clubs has been agreed. However, if you'd like to get involved your school can purchase club packages for the primary programme from Youth Sport Direct.