Arts and Crafts skills were developed when children designed and made fantastic Olympic Mascots, giving them their own names and characteristics. They thought carefully about the colours, symbols, and props! “I put a red phone box on my Olympic Puppet to represent London because that’s where the Olympics are held.” Casey-Jayne, aged 11.

Day three encouraged children to use technical thinking, along with developing their trial and error skills. The challenge was to build their own racing buggy using Robolab software. “It was really cool and fun because it was really hands on and you got to build your own design.” Megan Allard, aged 11. An Olympic race took place once all the buggies were built. We had the 100m Sprint, and a relay race! “I felt happy when I won the Gold Medal for the 100m Sprint, and I even got a real Saints Medal!” Katie Clark, aged 11.
The girls were then put to their pace with their own practical tag rugby session by one of our great Saints Community Coaches. They were challenged to use dodging, sprinting, and tactical ideas. There were lots of laughs, fun and games!

Creativity flowed throughout Day 4 during a superb Animation session. Lego and plasticine were tools used to create characters to some fantastic animated clips. The girls positioned and captured every small movement, and included sound effects! Professional animations girls, well done!!

The last tomorrow (Friday) the group will be coached in the Olympic sport of Trampolining at Northampton Trampoline Club who have many Olympic hopefulls at their club. Once we get back to the Study Centre the group will have lunch and complete a Photostory on their time at the centre.

A fantastic five days during which the girls have tried many new activities and made new friends in preparation for beginning their Secondary school lives in September. good luck to all of you at NSG.

We have two more days left at the Saints Study Centre so watch this space to find out what we get up to!

Name Badge Making
Maths Player Card Games
The Paper Tower Challenge
Maths is fun session
Tag Rugby Sessions

The group still have a Stadium Tour, Circus Skills and Animation workshops to experience over the next two days along with more tag rugby sessions. They will then complete a Photo Story on their four days of activities.

Kieron and his actors have worked in the UK and around the world providing interactive drama sessions and performances that reach 10,000 children every year. He is the man behind the critically acclaimed film and software package for schools Shakespeare Works! which is distributed here in the UK and worldwide.

Kieron was very excited at returning to the Saints with his actors who delivered four successful workshops as well as their show package, Shakespeare Invigorated! This consisted of four 100% interactive drama workshops, followed by a performance by Kieron and his actors of Shakespeare’s classic play Romeo and Juliet – it was fast, funny, in your face, authentic Shakespeare with the original language, costume and music.

Great fun was had by all the pupils and staff during the two days experiencing this new and interactive way of learning about Shakespeare and his times.

We were also grateful for the support from Barclaycard, both with the funding of these two days and with the support from their staff who helped the groups with the activities in the workshops. We hope they learnt a little as well!!

Schools taking part were; The Duston School; Roade School; Sponne School, Towcester; St. James; Whitehills; Kingsthorpe Grove; Cedar Road; Paulespury; Abington Vale; Bridgewater and Parklands Primary Schools.

The audience was treated to a demonstration of Circus skills by the County Jester, Kevin Burke during which many of the children came out in front of the audience to perform their new found skills.

Once the speeches and demonstrations were over, all the children were presented with certificates and medals by Jonny Clarke and Ben Nutley from the Saints Squad as well as Bernie!! After the presentations the children collected their “goody bags” from the mentors which included a Study Centre T shirt, an autograph book, a Saints pen, pencil and pencil case and of course a cream egg as it will soon be Easter time!!!

A great evening was had by all. Well done to all our young learners who have completed 22 hours of study support which will definitely help them in their future schooling. Good luck to you all in the future!

Within Northamptonshire we have been offering PfS programmes for seven years.  These programmes have been focused on raising standards in literacy and numeracy in underachieving Key Stage 2 and 3 pupils, by engaging them through sport, in an extended course of voluntary out of school study support activities.  Feedback from schools and parents has been very positive and has reflected local and national evaluations.

We have also offered, and will continue to offer on a traded basis,  an additional range of high quality day time and holiday programmes that extend and enrich the school curriculum, to meet the needs of vulnerable and at risk groups as well as Gifted and Talented students.  We have a proven track record of successfully engaging with a wide range of students including the most difficult to reach and hope to continue to work with these young people.

The work of the Study Centres has a significant contribution to make to the new Government’s plan for Children and Young People:

◦How pupils are progressing in their attainment in English and Maths between Key Stages
◦The use of “a wider range of providers to offer services to young people”
◦Ensuring a strong start for disadvantaged children
◦Narrowing the gap in educational attainment
We believe that Study Centre provision has a key role to play in the early intervention and prevention agenda particularly in relation to supporting transition and in supporting School Behaviour and Attendance partnerships in their work with both primary and secondary age pupils.

The unique selling point of the Study Centres is their link to and use of sport as a vehicle for engaging and inspiring children and young people.  With the Olympics on the horizon, we have developed a range of themed programmes that can be delivered at the Centres, at the Grendon satellite centre or in schools, either by teachers or as student led activities.  We are proud to say that we have achieved the Inspire Mark for a number of these Olympic themed programmes.  We are also involved in the national Supporter to Reporter programme, and will be delivering a Cultural Olympiad digital photography project, CLIX.

For more information contact your local study centre, or ring Val Sudlow on 01604 237150