The government provides schools with additional funding (PE & Sport Premium) for PE & Sport in order to make additional and sustainable improvements to the quality of PE, physical activity and sport. The Chief Medical Officer recommends that children have access to at least 60 minutes of sport and physical activity per day, 30 minutes of this is to be delivered during the school day. The PE & Sport Premium can be used to achieve this.

The funding is allocated directly to schools so it can be used in ways that work best for our pupils. The following reports outline how we have invested the funding at St Mark’s and our intended plans for this year’s funding.

St Mark's PE Policy

Congratulations to our St Marks Sporting Stars who were invited to an awards evening at the Purbeck School with guest speaker Jamie  Barrows who is the fastest snowboarder in the world! He gave an inspirational speech which the audience very much enjoyed; explaining the journey that had led him to being the world record holder and explained that his story will be on the television at some point in the future.

Our winning pupils are a super talented group! Between them they have represented the school in:

• Athletics
• Cricket
• Cross Country
• Football
• Handball
• Netball
• Rugby
• Tennis

As well as this the boys have all also been outstanding Sports Leaders; giving up their lunchtimes to organise active play for our younger pupils.

They all also play sport to a high standard in our community representing academies and even the County. We are very proud of all their achievements and look forward to following their success stories as they move to secondary school.

School Clubs

Community Club Coaches & Initiatives

As a school we appreciate the opportunity we have to work with a number of community club coaches.

Our staff were lucky enough to work with Gemma from Head Over Heels Gymnastics, this was a fantastic opportunity for some in-house CPD and gave us all new ideas about how the apparatus can be incorporated into our lessons.

All our pupils and staff have worked with Jon Gregory from Swanage Football Club in curriculum time and Jon has also coached our UKS2 Football Teams and provided multi-sports training for our LKS2 pupils as well.

In the Summer Term we were again fortunate to have Tim Ives from Swanage Cricket Club working alongside staff and pupils from all key stages. This is an annual event and Tim is always a popular visitor with both staff and pupils. Jon Gregory also worked with KS2 staff to support our cricket lessons.

Ryan and Paul from Swanage Tennis Club are regular visitors to the school in school running tennis clubs and working with staff and pupils from Year 2 to Year 6 in May for four weeks of coaching in the build up to the Swanage Tennis Tournament.

Inter-School Competitions 2023-24

Congratulations to our Year 5 & 6 pupils who have represented the school in the Purbeck Football League. Our mixed team finished in 3^rd place, missing out on the final because of goal difference. They were very disappointed especially as we beat Sandford (one of the finalists) away in our final match. They have played some fantastic football throughout the league and I am so proud of the way they supported each other. We will miss the strength of our Year 6 players next season but this will be a good opportunity for our younger players to represent St Marks.

The girls team sailed through to the final with some big victories against Swanage Primary and Sandford. They drew our home fixture against St Marys so we knew this would be a close game.

The girls battled hard with St Marks taking an early lead, unfortunately St Marys responded strongly and just after half time had taken a 3-1 lead. The girls continued to push hard and were awarded a penalty which we scored. It was a ‘nail biting’ final few minutes as we battled to score the equaliser with our talented goal keeper keeping us in the game. Sadly, when the final whistle blew the score was still 2-3. Congratulations must go to a very talented St Marys Team.

We have only played 1 x Yr 6 pupil in this competition so hope next season we will continue to build on this experience. We will miss our captain as she progresses to the secondary school, she has been such an inspirational player always giving 100% and supporting her younger team mates.

Thank you to Mr Gregory for his hard work with both our teams and Mr Green who has been assisting with coaching our girls’ team during the matches.

Our Year 3 & 4 pupils have had a couple of tennis lessons at school and are just about to start their coaching sessions with the Swanage Tennis Club in preparation for the Swanage Tennis Tournament. The Purbeck Tennis Festival was therefore a good indicator of how they are progressing with their racket skills.

The children took part in 6 skill stations which tested their agility, speed and hand eye coordination. There was a scoring system for each station and a sports leader from the Purbeck School demonstrated each activity and explained how to keep the score. The pupils demonstrated excellent focus during all of the activities as they competed in their pairs. The catching the ball with a cone and the coconut shy event were the most popular.

After this the children played some mini fun matches. When all the activity scores were calculated St Marks came 3^rd out of 8 schools, a great result. We will now continue to practise our tennis in lessons ready for the Swanage Tournament in June.

The first competitive event of the Autumn Term was the Year 5 & 6 Purbeck Football Tournament which was held on Thursday 12^th October. 7 teams attended the event which was played as a ‘round robin’ event with each game lasting 12 minutes.

The team won their matches against Stoborough, Wareham St Marys & Swanage Primary. They drew 0-0 against Bere Regis & St Marys which left St Mark’s undefeated going into the final match against Sandford which they needed to win to be overall winners. The final game was another excellent whole team performance and a very even match. The final score was another 0-0 result which left us undefeated and in 2^nd place. The pupils were pleased their runner-up medals and 1 of our team was a double medallist as Ollie S was awarded a player of the tournament medal too.

The pupils worked so well as a team and I was so proud of their excellent behaviour and support of each other.

The team will play again after half term where they will face St Marys A & B Teams in the mixed Purbeck Cup and our girls will debut in the Purbeck Girl’s Cup against Stoborough. Both of the teams will be working hard at the school football clubs on Monday with Jon Gregory from Swanage Football Club.

With the first attempt at the tournament being rained off the girls were pleased that Miss Hamblin from the Purbeck School could find another space on the very busy sporting calendar.

The girls were off to a winning start in their first game against Wareham St Marys. They followed this with two more victories against Sandford Primary and then Stoborough. Next up was St Marys which was a very tight game and ended 0-0. After this St Marks played Swanage Primary which ended 1-1. So, like the mixed event the girls managed to not lose a game.

The girls lost out on 1^st place by a goal difference of 2 to St Marys. The team were pleased with their silver medals and will be back on the pitch again in 2 weeks when they play the first of their Purbeck Cup games against Stoborough.

The first competitive event of 2024 was the Year 4 & 5 Purbeck Cross Country Competition. Children were selected from our intra cross country event which was held before Christmas. 

The 16 children who represented St Marks all showed great determination and should be very proud of their performances. The course was challenging as it is longer than our school run and was also muddy in parts.

Congratulations to Phoebe & Henry who achieved individual 3^rd places. A special mention to Bradley too, who stopped his own race to pick up another competitor who had fallen over.

Our overall results were:

Year 5 Boys: 2^nd

Year 4 Girls: 3^rd

Year 5 Boys: 3^rd

Overall Competition: 3^rd

After half term our Year 6 pupils will have their competition. Good Luck Year 6!

Inter School Competitions 2022-23

Year 5 & 6 Purbeck Football Competition

The first competitive sporting event of the year was held on Thursday 13th October. This came in the form of the year 5 & 6 Purbeck Cup. Our team had a number of Year 5 pupils in it and for them this was their first opportunity to represent the school at football.9 schools entered the event, with these being divided into 3 pool groups. The team worked hard but played too much football close to our own goal which resulted in a loss to Stoborough in our first match. In the second match we pushed forward more and beat Lulworth and Winfrith. This put us in the middle pool for the final section of the afternoon which was an all Swanage fixture, against St Marys and Swanage Primary!

The competition was close with us all winning one match 1-0 and losing one 0-1. The final overall result was a joint 4^th place with our fellow Swanage Schools.

The team will continue to train hard with Mr Gregory as we are entered in the Purbeck Cup which will start in November and continue into 2023.

Impressive Progress

Our girl’s football team played with increased confidence this year. I was so impressed with their improved skill levels and positional awareness. We did not feature in the top three places which I know disappointed the girls but they won a match; drew two and only lost two matches each of which was by only by 1 goal so the results were all very close. Interestingly the overall winners Stoborough were the team the girls beat. Some of the girls are now playing for Swanage as well as training at our school club and the additional practices are clearly working. Thank you to Mr Gregory for his coaching both in and out of school.

The girls will now continue to train as there will be another tournament after half term.

The St Marks pupils were very excited about attending the Handball Festival at the Purbeck School. For some of our younger pupils this was the first time they had represented the school and for our older pupils Handball is always very popular. The children took part in a series of drills in preparation for the games to be played later in the afternoon. As always the Sports Leaders were well prepared and led the drills in a friendly fashion.

The drills were designed to assist with goal scoring, defence & movement with and without the ball. Moving while holding the handball was the main aspect of the game that the pupils needed to develop. In Handball players are allowed to travel for 3 x steps after catching the ball.

After the drills the pupils played in some friendly matches where they demonstrated how much they had learned during the afternoon. The St Marks players were dominant in all their games and I look forward to seeing them playing in a competitive tournament in the future.

The annual trip to Swanage & Wareham Rugby Club came a little too early for St Marks this year. Unfortunately, we missed so many lunchtime practices due to frozen pitches we had to learn a lot at the event. Despite this the players coped well with the off side rule and the unique to rugby passing back of the ball. With only 1 x year 6 pupil being in the team most will have another opportunity to play next year; our focus will need to be support play and speed of recycling the ball. The pupils enjoyed the opportunity to play at a different venue and the rugby club always makes the local primary school welcome.

After the warm up our players played against Stoborough, Wool Sandford, Bovington & Corfe.

We drew 2 x matches and finished the festival with a win.

The final event of the half term was the Year 4 Tag Rugby Festival. At this event the pupils spend the first half of the afternoon receiving coaching from the sports leaders from Purbeck. Our team had all played tag rugby at school during their PE lessons but a revision opportunity was very welcome.

The pupils practised tagging, passing and support play through a series of drill stations spread around the astro turf at the Purbeck School. Some of these were games based in preparation for the mini games at the end of the event.

Our pupils played exceptionally well in the mini-games and despite the majority of the team being football players they adapted to the passing backwards rule extremely well! They were talented taggers and showed great speed, scoring numerous tries. Mrs Hamblin the event organiser commenting on our super sprinting in the final game.

Congratulations to our cross country team who competed in the Purbeck Cross Country Championships at the end of January.

Some of the team had been training with Mrs Martin and Mr Johnson at Monday lunchtime’s running club and their hard work certainly paid off.

Year 5 placed 5^th in the overall team events in both the boys and girls events. Our top boy came in 2^nd place and top girl in 9^th. An excellent effort from all the runners.

Year 4 boys placed; 5^th, 11^th, 12^th & 19^th giving them a total of 47 points. This earned them 4^th overall place but they only missed out on 2^nd position by 2 x points!

The Year 4 girls had a fantastic score sheet placing; 1^st, 7^th, 8^th & 9^th. Their score of 25 points earned them overall 1^st place, by 1 x point over St Marys.

When all the points were added up St Marks Year 5 team placed 6th out of 8 and our Year 4 team placed 2^nd out of 9, missing the top spot by a single point!

The first event of the busy Summer Calendar was the Year 5 & 6 Athletics Competition. This was a new event and had been added to the calendar to be used as a trial to select a team of athletes to represent Purbeck at the County Athletics Championships. Unfortunately, it appears that the County Championships is now not being held this year but this was still a fantastic opportunity to compete against the best athletes in our area.

The event began with the 600m, a distance that we have struggled with previously but with Amelia 3^rd, Ruaridj 4^th & Ella 6^th the team was off to a great start.

Next up was the 150m which we only had 1 x competitor in but Jesse did St Marks proud coming in 1^st place. Whilst this event was on the track Nala was our first competitor in a field event, taking part in the Throwing event. She threw 29.10m to take 2^nd  place. Her smile said it all!

Back to the track where the 75m was the next event. Lacey ran a great race in a personal best time and she was followed by Kaleb who took another 1^st place, leading from the start! The team was now feeling confident as the next lot of field events took place. Kaleb rushed from the sprint to the throw, where he gained another 1^st place with a throw of 40.10m.

When this was finished the long jump started. This year this was Standing Long Jump as there were issues with the long jump pit. Amelia came 8^th in this and Jesse took a 2^nd place, so more points for the team from both competitors.

The finale for the afternoon was the relay, and due to our small team, we only had 2 x teams in this event. Our Yr 5 girls did some great baton changes and finished 6^th which just left the Yr 6 boys race to finish off the afternoon. What a finish it was they led from the start, performed 3 x super change overs and were the clear winners!

We had to wait until the next day for the result but I am pleased to report that our Year 6 Boy’s team took overall 1^st place. I am so proud of the whole team who volunteered to take part and practised through their lunch times. I hope that next year we will be able to take a bigger team to the event.

The last competition of the half term was a Dorset Games Qualifying event for Handball. This is a popular sport with our Year 6 pupils so they were keen to attend. Unlike the festivals only a few schools entered so some of the larger schools took two teams to the competition. The team played well winning 3 of their 5 games.

The St Mark’s players demonstrated some outstanding attacking moves, with powerful shots from the edge of the circle. The high level of skills on display was commented on by the competition organiser Miss Hamblin from the Purbeck School.

Unfortunately we just missed out on a qualifying place for the Dorset Games, but the pupils gained in experience, which was particularly useful with some of the Year 6 boys attending a Dorset Team selection event later in the month.

Years 5 & 6 Tag Rugby Tournament

After a two year wait we were finally able to return to the Swanage & Wareham Rugby Club for the Years 5 & 6 Tag Rugby Tournament. Our team of 9 players had attended our school club on a Thursday lunchtime where our tagging ability had improved week after week. Our team also has two club pupils who play for the Swans, which is always going to be a bonus.

We kicked off the tournament with an win over St Mary & Josephs; this was followed by a very exciting 3-3 tie against Stoborough; after this we won all of our next 5 matches against Sandford, Bovington, Lulworth, Swanage Primary & Wareham St Marys.

Even with such great results we were unsure of how other fixtures had played out so the pupils waited excitedly for the overall scores. There was a big cheer when St Marks was announced as the overall winners and the smiles were huge.

The children were a credit to the school, not just because of their winning ways on the pitch but also their incredible team support for each other and outstanding behaviour.

Well done champions!!

Year 5 & 6 Netball Festival

On March 17th our squad of 7 netball players took part in the Purbeck Netball Tournament. This year the competition was divided into two sections, one of which was a Dorset Games qualifier and the other was a mini festival.  St Mark's took part in the latter event as I felt we needed some additional coaching with our positional play and footwork. In Bee netball the players have to change positions at the end of each half, as well as at the end of the game, this  is lot to take on board in your first competition. Our event was still organised as a competition but we were permitted to coach from the side line and the umpire spent more time explaining why players had been penalised.

Our results were 3 out of 3 wins:

St Marks v St Georges 4-0

St Marks v Wool 9-0

St Marks v Corfe Castle 3-1

It was great to see the team gain in confidence after each round and our shooting success took some of the players by surprise as during club our shooting has not been so successful! Our positional play certainly improved too and this combined with smiles and sunshine made the afternoon one to remember.

An additional surprise was that our section was also awarded medals for our 1st place achievement. Back to training now so we can take part in the A section next year. Super effort team!

Congratulations to our Year 5 & 6 pupils who played in the semi-final of the Purbeck Football Cup. After a hard fought game they lost 0-2 against a strong Sandford Team. After the game the boys were obviously disappointed but I couldn't have been more proud of their attitude when they all stayed behind to attend football club after school. The following Monday with no more fixtures on the calendar, they were all back again. This says so much about your resilience and why as a school we are so proud of you. A huge thank you to Mr Gregory who has coached all our UKS2 Football Clubs this season and supported the staff Football CPD across the whole school.

The final week of the half term was the final week of the cross country competition. This time our Year 6 pupils tackled the 2km course. Our first two runners back both finished in the top ten with Jesse finishing 5th and Kaleb 7th. The rest of our runners all completed the course despite one being injured and our only female competitor stopping her race to assist him. An excellent example of our pupils putting others in front of themselves. The final results showed our boy's team taking a very creditable overall 3rd place.

Year 5 & 6 Purbeck Football Tournament

After eighteen months of no tournaments it was great to have the opportunity to take part in the Purbeck Football Tournament. The boys were excited about participating in this event and for some members of the team this was the first time they had represented the school in anything. The event in all honesty came a little early in the season for us as the boys had only had a couple of chances to train with our new coach Jon Gregory, but we couldn’t miss the first event on the competition calendar.

On arrival the boys set about warming up and a big thank you to Jesse and Kaleb who demonstrated their sports leaders skills arranging equipment and organising some great drills.

Nine schools took part in the event which was organised and officiated by the Purbeck Sport’s leaders. Each game was only 6 x minutes one way with 3 minutes to get to your next game, so the whole tournament was a fast pace!

St Mark’s drew their first three matches against, Sandford, Corfe & Bere Regis. We then lost the next three against Swanage Primary,  Stoborough and St Marys who were the eventual top three teams. We finished the tournament with another 0-0 draw against Lulworth and a  2-0 win against Wareham St  Marys.

We were very proud of the way the boys played and supported each other on and off the pitch.  Our next match will be on November 8^th when we play St Marys away in the Purbeck Cup. Keep training hard boys!

Handball

Handball continues to be very popular at St Marks so we have run clubs for Upper & Lower KS2 this term. All the pupils selected for the competition have attended our lunchtime club.

The event had to be moved outside because of the Covid restrictions so fortunately the weather continued to cooperate. The afternoon began with an hour of coaching from the Purbeck Sports Leaders. This focused on passing, dribbling & shooting and was a great way to warm up for the event.

We started with a convincing victory over Lulworth & Winfrith which gave all the players a lot of confidence. As the matches were only 5-a-side we swapped the whole team over after the first game but kept our winning ways beating Stoborough 4-0. Next up was St Marys and after leading 1-0 for most of the match we conceded a goal and had to settle for 1-1 draw. We then suffered our only defeat of the tournament losing 0-1 to Swanage Primary. Our final match against Wareham St Mary was another convincing 5-0 win.

Our overall placing in the tournament was joint 2^nd which was a fantastic achievement. A great team effort and with 6 of our players still only in Year 5 we will be looking forward to this event next year.

Our star of the tournament this week goes to Jesse who was incredible in the goal

Sporting Festivals

As we approach the end of a busy school football season, it was great to take 20 x pupils to the Purbeck School for two afternoons of fun football. We began with the pupils from Year 4 who were all very excited. I know this as they kept asking me what time we were leaving school! The children played 8 x matches so there was a lot of opportunities for them all to try different positions. To illustrate this, we had 4 x different goal keepers throughout the event! 4 x pupils scored goals and our defence were very determined. Many of this group attend our school club with Mr Norman and have also attended some additional football sessions with Mr Gregory. The Years 5 & 6 event followed the same format, again 8 x matches so another busy afternoon. The children chose where they wanted to play but this time, we only had 2 x goal keepers! It was great to see how much some of the children who attended this event when they were in Year 4 have improved and how their confidence has improved. No points are awarded for this event but the children were all proud of their results. I was very proud of their team support and positive attitude both on and off the pitch.

Our Year 3 & 4 pupils attended the coaching session at Purbeck which was organised by the Dorset Cricket Board. This should have been an opportunity for the children to learn batting, bowling and fielding skills however the terrible weather ensured this was difficult from the start.

The pupils took part in a short warm up and started to practise their bowling skills when it became obvious that we needed to abandon the field.

After this the children played some indoor cricket until the end of the afternoon but this was difficult due to the number of schools attending. Despite this we did see that some of our children have some great batting & bowling potential.

As usual our Sporting events are up and running straight away! On Thursday 21^st September, 10 very excited members of Year 4 attending the multi-sports festival. This is a great opportunity for children to take part in a range of non-competitive events that are designed to encourage cooperation and communication.

This year there were some new events with the very popular Quidditch being included. The pupils spent the afternoon scoring goals, grabbing tags, throwing, catching and directing each other while wearing blindfolds! At the end of the afternoon when they were asked to choose their favourite activity the majority answer was “EVERYTHING!”

After just 1 x club session, we ventured to the Purbeck Handball Festival. It was a VERY wet and windy afternoon but as always, our children just carried on with a smile! It was so windy we had to use the Quidditch goals as the Handball ones would have blown away!

After a group warm up, Miss Hamblin the Primary Sports Coordinator explained the Handball stations. This was a great opportunity for the pupils to cover all the skills required to play handball in one afternoon. The pupils took part in 6 x activities to help them with their throwing, catching, defending and scoring skills.

After the skills stations there was time for the pupils to put these to work as we played 3 x friendly matches.

Due to the wet, windy weather the Year 4 Handball Festival was moved to the Sports Hall at the Purbeck School. The participants from St Mark’s were super keen to start all the activities which had been set up for them as an introduction to this new sport.

As with the upper KS2 event the stations support the key elements of Handball so throwing & catching, scoring, defending and movement with and without the ball. The Sport’s Leaders from the upper school as always explained and demonstrated the required skills clearly and made each activity fun.

After the skills stations were completed, there were three rounds of matches, where the pupils put their skills into practice. There was a lot to think about with rules being introduced as the games were played. Our footballers found it challenging not to enter the semi- circle when they were in possession and able to shoot at the goal. A few pupils tried out being the goal keeper, which was great to see.

The pupils enjoyed the opportunity to try out Handball and 3 of the group have now been attending the KS2 Handball Club on a Friday lunchtime.

The atrocious weather meant the Years 5 & 6 Netball Festival had to be moved inside but at least it wasn’t postponed, as we have so many back upped fixtures still to play this term, we are struggling to find enough days in the week!

The pupils worked on a range of skills with the Sports Leaders from the Purbeck School. These included shooting, passing and defence. Our netball shooting improved immensely with all pupils managing to score lots of goals.

At the end of the drills section the pupils played 4 x matches with mixed results. As a team we need to work on improving our footwork skills and positional knowledge so next year we can enter the competitive netball event.

The last activity of the half term was a cricket festival at the Purbeck School. This was organised by Michelle from Dorset Cricket assisted by the leaders from Purbeck.

The sunshine provided perfect conditions for the afternoon’s activities. The competition was set up as paired cricket where each pair faces 2 x overs. They remain in for the whole 12 balls, losing runs if they are caught, stumped or run out. 5 of our pupils currently play at the Swanage Cricket Club so they were familiar with the format.

The St Mark’s pupils played 2 x complete matches, winning both, hitting a number of boundaries and bowling very few wide balls. One piece of fielding from Lewis was exceptional as he successfully completed a diving one handed catch!

The final sports event of the Spring Term was the upper KS2 Football Festival. Like the previous week’s event, this competition is for pupils who do not play football at academy level.  This was a great opportunity for pupils to take part who have not represented the school at many events but who have attended our weekly school football club.

The pupils taking part played in a number of different positions and showed a great aptitude when taking on varying roles on the pitch.

Football continues to be the most popular sport amongst our pupils and we are fortunate to have been able to provide clubs for pupils from years 1-6 this year for both terms. Thank you to Miss Kemp & Mr Norman for running these clubs at lunch time. A big thank you to Mr Jon Gregory, from Swanage Football Club, who continues to work with our staff and has coached our older pupils at their school clubs.

After last year’s success the Purbeck School again hosted their successful Football Festivals. These events are for pupils who enjoy football but who are not at football academies. I have to say that the rain did not stop for the whole event but despite us all being soaked through there was not one complaint. St Mark’s played in 7 x matches which gave everyone an opportunity to play in a range of positions.

There were some super saves from our goal keepers and a number of goals scored too. Just as importantly were the smiles from the players. This is a super event for boosting the children’s confidence. There are no official scores kept for this style of competition but the children knew that they scored more goals than their opponents in 5 of the matches!

The Multi-Sports event on Thursday 19^th January was the first trip out with our Year 1 pupils. They were very quiet climbing onto the bus but soon grew in confidence and volume! This was also the first time that an indoor sports event had been played in the main hall at Purbeck and the new venue worked just as well as the sports hall.

The children were hosted by a group of 3 x Year 8 Sports Leaders including one of our former pupils, Sean, who did an amazing job explaining the activities and encouraging the team all afternoon.

There were 10 activities for the children to undertake, all of which required different skill sets both physically and cooperatively. The children climbed through hoops, jumped over speed bounce obstacles and sprinted over the indoor athletics steppers.

They were all absolute super stars and we were so proud of the effort they put in and their excellent behaviour. 

As always our Year 5 & 6 pupils were looking forward to the Purbeck Handball Festival. This year Miss Hamblin decided to change the focus of the drills so that they were specific to Handball rather than practising throwing and catching which we have done in previous years. The pupils took part in a series of activities led by the Purbeck Sports Leaders. These were designed to develop goal scoring, team work and movement with the ball. The pupils found the latter the most tricky task as it is so different from netball and basketball which they are more familiar with; as in Handball the players are allowed to travel 3 x steps while carrying the ball. The pupils enjoyed the drills and were keen to use them within game situations.

The second part of the afternoon was spent participating in a festival of friendly matches. The pupils played extremely well; scoring lots of goals and demonstrating superb team work. They will have an opportunity to use these skills in the Handball Tournament during the Spring Term.

The Year 4 pupils were very excited about attending the Handball Festival at the Purbeck School. For some of the pupils this was the first time they had represented the school. The children took part in a series of drills in preparation for the games to be played later in the afternoon. As always the Sports Leaders were well prepared and led the drills in a friendly fashion.

The drills were designed to assist with goal scoring, defence and movement with and without the ball. Moving while holding the handball was the main aspect of the game that the pupils needed to develop. In Handball players are allowed to travel for 3 x steps after catching the ball.

After the drills the pupils played in four friendly matches where they demonstrated how much they had learned during the afternoon. The St Marks players were dominant in all their games and I look forward to seeing them playing in a competitive tournament in the future.

Dare To Believe 2022

Our busy sporting calendar began on September 22nd with the first of our Dare to Believe events. Pupils from Yrs 2-6 participated over three consecutive weeks. The events are designed for pupils to participate in a range of multi-skills stations, where they are able to learn new skills while having fun. These are always popular with all the local primary schools and with 12 schools participating there are also opportunities to work with pupils from other schools. This year's stations included: frisbee, target throwing, roller football, obstacle races, tag, target kicking, Rob the Nest, "Whats the Time Mr Wolf?" and the ever popular Rock, Paper & Scissors. The Sports' Leaders from the Purbeck School organise each activity and work really hard to ensure that the children enjoy the afternoon. For many of our pupils this was their first visit to the Purbeck School and judging by the smiles and comments they are looking forward to visiting again in the near future.

This year the Purbeck School has added some new events to the sporting calendar in the form of Football Festivals. These events were for pupils who enjoy football but who do not play regular football outside of school.

The events were a great opportunity for a number of pupils who have not represented the school yet either but who regularly attend our school clubs. The format for both festivals was a Round Robin event so the maximum number of matches could be played. It also gave pupils an opportunity to try playing different positions, which was especially evident in the Year 3 & 4 event where we had 5 x pupils trying out the role of goal keeper.  It was fantastic to see the smiles from pupils scoring their first ever goal and also great to see pupils confidence improving as they played more matches. 

We ended the Spring Term's sporting activities with the Year 1 Dare to Believe Festival. This was the first outing to the Purbeck for our Year 1 pupils and their teacher. As always the Purbeck hosted a fantastic event led by their young Sport Leaders. The children took part in a Round Robin of activities which included running, jumping and throwing. There were lots of smiles from everyone involved especially when playing 'Elephant football.' I am sure the children will be looking forward to taking part in more games like this at our school Multi-Sports Club next term.

Years 5 & 6 Dare to Believe

Year 4 Tag Rugby

This is a fantastic opportunity for pupils to experience an element of competition within a festival atmosphere. Ten pupils represented the school at this event. We began the afternoon with a series of drills which covered passing, catching, dodging and tagging. Each of the activities was taught by the Year 9 Sport's Leaders from the Purbeck School who did an outstanding job. The children smiled all the way through the afternoon which was exactly what this event is all about. After the training drills there was an opportunity for the children to use their skills within some mini games. As this is a festival there are no scores read out or overall winners but of course the children know what they have achieved in each game. The St Mark's team were able to tell their parents on our return to school that they had 'won' all three of their games. We currently have three pupils from Year 4 who play at the Swanage & Wareham Rugby club on a Sunday morning and hopefully we may have some more after this successful afternoon.

Bronze Ambassadors

Our latest group of pupils to benefit from the Purbeck Sports Partnership Leadership Programme began their training in November. As always, the pupils had written applications in order to be selected for their important roles. The morning began with the collection of their prized Bronze Ambassadors tee-shirts!

After a quick change the pupils began their first task which was about the role of being a leader and its link with the School Games values which are:

Determination

Honesty

Passion

Respect

Self-belief

Team work

The young leaders then looked at some of the games and activities they can use in school which require minimum equipment but provide lots of fun!

After 3 sessions of practical work, the pupils then met to discuss their ideas for the activities they can run back at St Marks with our younger pupils. They had lots of suggestions which I am looking forward to seeing them implement in the not-so-distant future. The children will have a timetable which will enable them to still take part in their own clubs and will supplement the clubs being organised by our Year 6 pupils. We are very lucky to have such committed, talented and enthusiastic pupils.

Bronze Ambassadors

At St Mark's we have ten Bronze Ambassadors in Year 6 and 16 in Year 5. We were very fortunate that Dan Moody and Shelley Hamblin from the School Sport's Partnership provided 'in-house' training for our pupils when Covid made it impossible to attend the training at the Purbeck School. The training looks at using the STEP principle:

Space

Task

Equipment

People

A big focus this year was on organising games which used minimal equipment. Our Bronze Ambassadors work in teams at lunchtime assisting with equipment and organising games for all year groups.

Daily Physical Activity

Daily Physical Activity is promoted at St Marks and our pupils are aware of the Chief Medical Officers recommended activity level. This being an hour of activity every day, 30 minutes of which should be provided in school time. Each of our classes has their own 'Active Activity' box which they use at break and lunchtimes. The pupils requested the equipment for each of their boxes which was then purchased using our Sport's Premium funding. At the end of each term we have a 'Swap Shop' so pupils can exchange equipment with other classes.

Year 4 are now using our recently marked out Daily Mile track. Pictured are the first group to be awarded their  'I can run a mile' wrist bands. I am sure there will be more awarded soon.

Skipping Day

In January we held a Skipping Day for all our classes with Dan the Skipping Man. This was very popular with many of our children who are now skipping at playtimes.