We play a lot of sport at Westbourne House. We are passionate about it because we feel sport isn’t just about physical activity. By playing sports, children benefit physically, mentally and socially. And the skills gained from team sports will help your child throughout their entire life.
Co-operation
Team sports develop a very special skill in co-operation. Co-operation is the foundation for good working relationships, friendships and more. We believe playing sport is one of the best ways to develop children’s skills in working together for a common aim whilst, along the way, learning to communicate clearly, listen to each other, encourage everyone to join in, be a leader one day and a follower the next. To recognise other children’s strengths and be responsible for a specific job in the team.
Perseverance
We believe our ethos in sport helps children learn to keep a positive mindset, even in the face of setbacks. Children work towards their goals, without giving up, whether this is working hard to win more matches, to get a preferred position, to get onto, or remain in, the A or B team or to improve their previous times.
A healthy approach to competition
Is it all about the winning? As well as aiming to win, our children are also learning that there are other advantages to games and matches: visiting different schools in this and other countries (this year we have a girls’ hockey trip to Holland and boys’ cricket tour to South Africa), meeting new people and becoming friends, enjoying doing your best and having fun along the way. The fact that the Westbourne team stayed on recently to cheer on Cranleigh Year 8s in the final of a tournament was a great sign that strong friendships have flourished.
Being modest with success
Westbourne House enjoys a lot of success in sport. All of our teams fare well against the competition, and every year a number of our Year 8 children receive highly competitive sports scholarships, and many play for county teams. We are often delighted to be National Champions in team sports, and we have also had our share of individual National Champions in athletics and swimming.
Whilst we celebrate all these successes, we encourage our pupils to be proud but modest with their success. It can be hard to be humble when you’ve just scored an amazing goal and feel like acting out your own colourful goal celebration. However, in life, being modest is a great skill and twinned with confidence in yourself and your abilities, it is a winning formula.
Coping with failure
We believe that when you experience failure, you are one step closer to succeeding. Losing never feels great, but we encourage children not to dwell on the failure itself, but to look at what went wrong, to learn from it and then adapt and get better as a team. There are many examples of truly great sportspeople and leaders who have failed many times over on the path to success. There are also many great players who act in a sporting way on losing. These are the qualities we encourage and talk about at the end of matches that haven’t quite gone according to plan!
Being an ambassador and host
When our pupils play matches at Westbourne House, our children play an important role as hosts to the visiting team. Children are assigned tasks, with the ‘match maker’ greeting the other team, while another sorts water bottles and bibs. Collectively the team has to look after the guests and host them at the match tea afterwards. It is part of the whole experience, getting yourself organised, being kind to others, socialising with the other team, chatting the game through, and making sure that the event runs smoothly.
Additionally, when our children go to other schools for sports matches, they represent Westbourne House. We often receive positive feedback about our sportsmanship, and we place a lot of emphasis on this.
Leadership
Inter-Patrol competitions provide an excellent chance for many different children to try their hand at leadership. It is wonderful to see the captains taking their role so seriously with some of the best warm ups we’ve ever seen, a proper plan for rotating players, and ensuring there is fair play.
Confidence
We believe in sport for all and our experienced coaches work with the children day in day out and know their skills extremely well. Our coaches rotate through the teams to ensure that everyone has an equal chance to improve. The child’s confidence is built up over time and the coaches are careful to ensure that each child plays in as many matches as possible each term, and that the child is placed appropriately so that their confidence is not knocked. Over time, our children become confident in their abilities and believe they can succeed.
Just recently we were all reminded that you can be a hero in any of our teams. Perform well at any level and the whole school celebrates the success!
Lifelong love of being active
At the end of the day, being active is healthy. Every day our children take part in games, often outside in the fresh air. Essentially they are running around, having fun and getting fit!
An excellent display of this was our recent festival of hockey, which brought together Old Westbournians, staff, parents and pupils in an enjoyable day of hockey. Our Old Westbournians will testify that old habits die hard… you never lose your love of being active.
Learn more about sport at Westbourne House.
