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Today year 7 and 8 students visited the Cobblers Study Centre and Northampton Town Football Club. This is part of the Double Club programme which this term so far has covered anti-racism and healthy eating. Mrs. Jeyes and Miss Lindon from Abbeyfield school accompanied them.

Russell Lewis from Cobblers in the Community led the stadium tour and was on amusing form, still high from the weekend’s 5-1 win over Crewe. He was full of stories, club history and football facts. He led students around Sixfields stadium to the players lounge, changing rooms, West stand, home dugouts, police cell, (we did think about leaving them there with Clarence) Carlsberg Lounge and boardroom.

All the way round he asked questions, which with all the football fans amongst the group, were answered. The Double Clubbers had plenty of questions themselves. They will be doing some ICT literacy work back in school, using photos taken on the tour.

In the boardroom Russell had the group acting as new directors to the club. 2 had to be the chairmen and the others thought up issues they wanted discussed and decisions on. These included stadium food, facilities, players, kit, sponsorship, seats and stadium improvements. They got into character by sitting around the meeting table and talking in pairs about how to phrase their ideas so as the chairmen would accept them. The most popular topic of conversation was food!

To read more about Double Club at Abbeyfield, visit their page.

School website: www.abbeyfield.northants.sch.uk

Despite it raining heavily today, year 8 students still participated whole-heartedly in their multiskills practical lesson with Graeme Wilson. They did their co-ordination, teamwork, communication, quick reactions drills inside in the Double Club room. Everyone enjoyed this fast-paced lesson and there wasn’t a moment to stand still. All shapes and sizes of balls were used for the various activities. The class worked in pairs, small groups and in 2 teams for the final netball-handball inspired (?!) game.

Anna Letts and Jo Morris from Northants Study Centres assisted Beccy and her team of 6th form mentors in the literacy, numeracy and ICT lessons today. These included ‘Sporting Excuses’, interactive mental maths games (with dice, cards and counters) and ‘Cricket and the 5 senses’ in ICT. To see more on these activities, visit the Thomas Becket page and SOW download.

This second cohort of year 8s to do Double Club seem an enthusiastic bunch. They were creative and humorous in their writing and energetic in their maths. They told staff what they had been doing in previous weeks and what they had been learning. They also took to the ‘Whaa’ or ‘Cheese’ game immediately!

The second cohort of year 8 pupils began their Double Club experience at Thomas Becket with school youth worker Beccy Roseman leading sessions. Anna will be supporting her in some lessons, but this term the school are taking ownership of the project and adapting it as they see fit. 6th form volunteers will be assisting. Students will be doing multi skills with Graeme Wilson from NSport, as well as the usual literacy, numeracy and ICT actvities. They will be going on two educational visits to the Saints and Steelbacks Study Centres later in the term.

Next term, students in the Double Club will be doing ‘multiskills’ as their practical with Graeme Wilson from Northamptonshire Sport.  Over the 12 week block they will do the following ; SAQ, Dodging, general ball handing , throwing, catching, foot skills, Multiskills relays, tactical skills, Racket skills, striking skills, team games & creativity.

For an example activity plan, download here: multi-skills-session-planner

The week after the Double Club students visited Sixfields Stadium, they wrote what they thought about its various facilities. The described the executive lounge, stands, shop, changing rooms, boardroom, pitch and the complex in general. They gave their opinions as to how they could be improved too. To listen to their thoughts, click on their voice recordings below.  

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Gutterball was the main teamwork game today. The trick is to maintain a slow speed and keep the same order of ‘gutter runners’. This game encourages communication, sportsmanship and co-ordination skills.

Everyone had a lot of fun and it was more energetic than it looks! Just don’t ask the boys team who won when it was boys versus girls!  

On Wednesday 3rd December 08, Thomas Becket Double Club students visited the Cobblers Study Centre and Sixfields Stadium. To see what they were working on, visit the school’s page.

http://double.northantsstudycentres.org/thomas-becket/

www.cobblersstudycentre.org

http://www.ntfc.co.uk/page/Home/

In November, year 8s from Abbeyfield visited the Steelbacks Study Centre for a stadium tour. They got behind the scenes access to Northants County Cricket Club and visited the gym, indoor arena, executive boxes, players’ balcony, Long room, supporter’s club, bar and saw the scoreboards. They had to do a literacy note-taking activity as when they got back to school in their ICT lesson, they produced a stadium tour postcard using this information.

Centre manager Yvonne Starsmeare led the tour and afterwards everyone made an origami T shirt while discussing sponsorship and logos. Yvonne showed the South Africa cricket world cup shirts for inspiration.

To see the Steelbacks Study Centre’s website: www.steelbacksstudycentre.org

Northants County Cricket Club’s ste: www.nccc.co.uk

To see Abbeyfield’s site

On Monday 1st December, year 8 students from Abbeyfield School’s Double Club visited Franklins Gardens Saints RFC, Saints Study Centre. They used photos taken when they visited the Steelbacks Study Centre and did a stadium tour of Northants County Cricket Club to construct a ‘photostory’. This is a free programme available to download from Microsoft whereby people can import photos, manipulate text, sound, voice recordings, music and make their own transitions. The group quickly picked up the skills needed and soon had some great ‘mini-movies’.They remembered an awful lot from their tour at the Steelbacks back in November, and used these facts to describe their photos. Some people proved to be naturals at commentating. Once they had gotten over their embarassment of hearing their voices that is!

Pete Austen, centre manager and Vicky Campkin, senior mentor ran the session, a big thanks to them.

To see what goes on at the study centre: www.saintsstudycentre.org

For the club: http://www.northamptonsaints.co.uk/2_20.php

The group watched NTFC play against Colchester on Saturday 29th November.

They have been working hard in the classroom based sessions in school with Mrs. Jeyes for several weeks now and have been doing practical sessions including table tennis with Andy Butler, the SScO (Sports co-ordinator partnership) there.

On Saturday 30th November, the pupils attended a game at Northampton Town Football Club with free tickets. This was a reward for their hard work in Double Club. Unfortunately Cobblers lost (boo!) but they all enjoyed it and well full of chat about it today!

For more on Abbeyfield School, visit their page

Scott Cohen from Arsenal Double Club visited Thomas Becket school this week to see how the year 8 students are getting on in their Double Club sessions. He joined us for the literacy, numeracy and practical lessons and was pleased to be able to join in, talk to the students and see what work they were doing.

For week 9’s activities, click here

Scott told the group about what happens at Arsenal Double Club schools and how he has been visiting other projects across the country. It was good to be able to have ‘premiership chat’, particularly recent events concerning Gallas being dropped from the Arsenal squad due to making negative comments about his team mates. This fitted in well with one of the day’s lessons: ’success and failure’.

To find out more about Arsenal Double Club, follow the links below:

http://double.northantsstudycentres.org/arsenal-double-club/

http://www.arsenal.com/the-club/community/arsenal-double-club