On Tuesday 1st April, we were very lucky to welcome in Sheree Cooper from the Harlequins Rugby Foundation, for a day of rugby teaching! Sheree Cooper plays for the Harlequins Women’s Rugby team in her ‘prop’ position and was keen to come in to Oakhyrst Grange to deliver some exciting sessions to inspire our children to play rugby. The children were in awe of having a professional rugby player teach them and were inspired by her journey.
Children in Years 2-6 all took part in a session which focused on spatial awareness, ball handling and the most-liked skill by the children… tackling! The older children in particular learnt how to safely tackle an opposing player, as well as learning how to fall safely if tackled themselves. They all fully embraced this challenge and it was great seeing them do something completely new, and even unnatural, to a lot of the children. I even had a go at tackling Sheree, but it came with little success! For the younger children, they learnt how to pass and catch a rugby ball correctly using the terminology ‘pocket to rocket’ and really improved throughout. We definitely have some gifted rugby players within the school.
Hopefully this is a partnership with Harlequins that we can continue with, and we look forward to providing for rugby opportunities to the whole school moving rowards.
Mr David Smith, Head of Sport