Richard Luscombe Argyle Community Trust is immensely proud of our continued sport, health and well-being work that is being delivered across the local communities of Plymouth, Devon and Cornwall. Most notably, our Joy of Moving programme, delivered in partnership with the EFL Trust and Ferrero. This funding allowed us to offer free sessions in local primary schools, all aimed at increasing participants knowledge and awareness of health and nutrition. Through Joy of Moving, Argyle Community Trust delivered 6-weeks of positive provisions, in 26 different schools across Devon and Cornwall, all of which utilised a blended approach of practical sports coaching and theory-based sessions. Key learning outcomes included raising awareness of a balanced lifestyle and an appreciation of maintaining physical health and activity levels. Similarly, Joy of Moving encouraged children to be physically active outside of school, something that is hugely significant within our city. Just under 10,000 children in Plymouth are classified as living in poverty, with the vast majority (over 75%) living in workless households. Through Joy of Moving, we aim to support this by offering positive physical activity free of charge to many children, in addition to their mainstream curriculum. The project also allows us to supply children with sport and exercise resources for them to enjoy from their homes or gardens, and in turn, reduces the reliance on accessing paid community sport.
Throughout the delivery year, there has been greater recognition of the role that sport can play in both the physical and mental health of children. Argyle Community Trust continued to operate in Primary Schools throughout the pandemic, ensuring that even though we were experiencing national lockdowns, children still had access to physical activity and education regarding healthy living through the Joy of Moving project. Plymouth is recognized as having significantly worse numbers of children classified as overweight or obese throughout their primary school journey and it was important that education around this didn’t stop. Through sustaining our Joy of Moving provision through lockdown, 1,560 pupils engaged with Project Sport, education and well-being sessions. In addition, our Joy of Moving programme allowed us to offer a Winter Festival to schools across Plymouth, South Hams, North Devon and Cornwall. This meant schools were able to share project workbooks and physical activity challenges for those pupils who were at home, to replicate what children of key workers were accessing within schools. In total, 32 schools engaged with this element of the programme, with over 5,597 children accessing said resources. Through making this project adaptation, we were passionate that no child involved in Joy of Moving should miss out on an opportunity to feel inspired by physical activity and learning.
Lipson Vale Deputy Head, Christine Marsh, adds, “Throughout the past year, children and families have spent a lot of time isolated at home away from school and their friends. Whilst in lockdown, it was great to be able to continue working with Argyle Community Trust who provided both the children in school and those learning from home with the opportunity to connect with each other by encouraging them to participate in the Joy of Moving games. The Joy of Moving games provided us with a fantastic opportunity to allow the children in school and those learning remotely to take part in the same physical activities and have fun! This enabled those at home to feel connected to those children still in school and to engage with their friends again, in what can only be described as a difficult time. Pupils across the school were set activities every week and we had lots of positive feedback from those at home who enjoyed some of the challenges with their peers.”
Argyle Community Trusts Plymouth & South Hams Regional Manager, Stew Walbridge, adds, “Being flexible and dynamic throughout the pandemic has been vitally important in offering impactful provisions within primary schools during the pandemic. Being able to meet the children’s and each schools’ individual needs was important and is a great example of the role our coaches played in supporting our partner schools. The Trust staff have done a fantastic job in making sure that Joy of Moving, and all its associated benefits, remained prominent within schools and in support of home learning. It was so important to ensure that children were still participating in physical activity, as well as an appreciation of living a healthy lifestyle, probably more than ever during lockdown. We are extremely proud to have supported schools, children and teachers throughout this period across Plymouth, Devon & Cornwall”.
