Sport at St Mary's

'At St Mary’s, sport is a way of life'

Scott Hagland – PE Teacher

At St Mary’s, we recognise the importance of sport and exercise in children’s lives. We want to engender a positive attitude to a wide range of sporting activities, and for children to enjoy participating in them. We aim to teach children good habits of daily exercise and an understanding of tactics and purpose. We recognise the existence of competition and aim to channel it into positive attitudes. We try to teach the children how to win and lose appropriately. We want children to become enthusiastic sports people throughout their lives.

All pupils receive 2 hours of good quality PE lessons each week. In addition, there are many extra-curricular clubs before, after school, and at lunch times, as well as opportunities to take part in various tournaments throughout the year.

We run a House Championship at lunch times, providing extra sport and competitions for all the children to participate in and win house points for their team. At the end of the year, we hold an annual summer Sports Day that consists of a house carousel competition and competitive races. The winning house over the duration of the year win an afternoon of sport, food and music as well as the coveted House Champions trophy.

St Mary’s attend the NHSSP District Sports events and tournaments throughout the year, which include cross-country, tag rugby, football, netball, rounders, basketball, speed stacking, boccia, golf, hockey, cricket festival and the District Athletics event.

St Mary’s have been extremely successful over the last couple of years, winning countless events. Arguably, our biggest achievements have come in boys and girls football. Both teams are currently the champions of the entire county. We are also District champions in golf, tennis, cricket and cross-country. In friendly festivals where there are no winners, we are very proud of our performances and have been voted as team of the day by other schools for our teamwork, self-belief and sportsmanship on numerous occasions.

St Mary’s also provide Bikeability and swimming lessons to our pupils.