Placing PE at the heart of the school, by placing the child at the heart of our Curriculum

Ronnie Heath, a former Head of PE, established Create Development in 2008 to engage and inspire young people in and through PE and Sport. He has been a winner of ‘Outstanding Achievement in Coach Education for London’, ‘England’s Basketball Coach of the Year’ and National Trainer for sports coach UK.

He will provide a keynote speech at the Mid and West Wales and South Central PESS consortia conference in June. But what should we expect?

Are we preparing children for the society we grew up in and know, or modern society or.... the future world?

What lessons have we learned from our previous practice? We top the list for ‘worst experience at school’ whilst a huge proportion of young people instead of being inspired by PE, are put off by it. Do we teach Sport, PE, the child, Megan? David? or dreams?

Why is PE essential, and what do we do better than any other subject? How can it make such a major impact on broader, emotional, learning and life skills? Can we, do we model the skills, qualities and abilities we expect of the young people we work with? Does our provision meet the outcomes we claim to be able to meet?  If we present and package ourselves well we can align very comfortably with the expectations of ESTYN and see our subject elevated to the highest status.

We are frequently judged on how well explain what we do. We will explore how we communicate better to the community, governors, senior management, parents and pupils about what PE is about and what we can achieve together. It will involve changes in our language and approach, celebrating the positive better and accepting the mistakes of our predecessors. 

Does our curriculum try and squeeze and chisel the young people into our existing programmes or is our provision broad and flexible enough to meet the needs of all individuals? Let’s explore what the future of PE might look like.