KIDS’ FITNESS
FITNESS 4 LIFE Matt Roberts, founder, Fitness 4 Life
“W
e launched Fitness 4 Life in 2013 as a social enterprise company with
a policy to reinvest profits back into the programme. It provides a solution to schools that need to increase their children’s activity levels and counter poor levels of fitness and exercise participation. “The system provides training for
teachers, giving them tools to guide pupils through a structured, daily 20-minute programme of regular, fun and vigorous exercises. Daily exercise attendance is logged on the software and accompanied by an app that provides full video support, diarised session planning and graphs of the performance of each child and school. Termly results give the
school and each child ownership and pride in their fitness development. “In a pilot programme at primary
schools across the London Borough of Lewisham, fitness scores among the children tested increased over a six-week period by an average of 12 per cent, and over a six-month period by an average of 21 per cent. “The programme empowers
schools to re-invest in the teaching staff while upskilling the workforce, and not only improves students’ fitness levels but also improves their self-confidence. It has also led to reduced levels of absenteeism and has even engaged teaching staff and parents into greater levels of exercise. “We’re working with Sport London
to roll out Fitness 4 Life into schools in all the London boroughs during 2015 and 2016. We also have schools across the UK launching the programme, and in UAE and Brazil in the coming year.”
School Gym model is engaging even those not normally interested in PE or sports “School Gym is having a significant
SCHOOL GYM
Dr Mark Bellamy, project manager, School Gym / Leisure Lines
“S
chool Gym is a concept that was developed and tested over a five-year period, and it’s now been
rolled out in Dyffryn Taf secondary school in Carmarthenshire and Cardigan secondary school in Ceredigion, both in Wales. It’s a complete system for physical wellbeing and the development of physical literacy, in partnership with the schools and our team at Leisure Lines GB, and it’s designed to tackle obesity in a fun, motivational way. “When we originally met the PE team
at Dyffryn Taf, it was clear they were onto something – developing a school
gym that pupils actually wanted to use. We worked with them to produce a complete equipment mix to support physical development, ensuring the whole set-up supported the school curriculum. It includes software for pupil expert coaching and monitoring of attainment levels, plus developing ‘train the trainer’ programmes to ensure School Gym can be rolled out country-wide. “We want young people to be in an
environment where they can play while developing the skills and knowledge that underpin true physical literacy. Much of the equipment is geared towards the gamification of PE, with the pupils making up their own games, rules and methods of scoring – for example, throwing medicine balls at alpha-numeric boards to answer maths questions, or making a numbered track where teams run to blocks to earn points by answering questions correctly. This helps ensure pupils who wouldn’t typically excel at PE become key members of the team.
60 Read Health Club Management online at
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impact on fitness and involvement levels – even among those not usually interested in PE or sports, many of whom are voluntarily attending additional sessions out of school hours – and obesity levels have dropped dramatically at the two schools. We’ve also seen the culture in the schools themselves change: staff have observed an improvement in behaviour, engagement, attitude, attendance, self- esteem and positivity among pupils. “In addition, Estyn reports at both
schools positively mention School Gym, and pupils who are moving from primary to secondary school are actively looking to attend these schools due to the School Gym. Cardigan School also has external students with special needs attending with their physiotherapists, using School Gym to exercise and undertake rehab work. “Another School Gym location will
open shortly, and we have a further three or four in the pipeline.”
May 2015 © Cybertrek 2015
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