Junior Sport

HomeFit Zoom

Thank you to all those families who took part in these sessions on Wednesday and Saturday over the course of Remote Learning. It was great to hear feedback where these sessions were a welcome break from screen time. Saturday’s session was the last as we phase back into face to face Sport training which begins this Saturday (30 May).

Wednesday Sport

A number of families may be familiar with the Prepare to Perform (P2P) program that has been circulating around different sporting associations which focuses on the prevention of injury in young players by helping them prepare as best as possible for the demands of the game. While P2P is a Rugby specific warm up program devised by the NSW Waratahs’ medical and performance team, the focus on injury prevention can be applied across all sports. Programs such as the P2P have been shown to reduce injuries in youth by as much as 80% and improve agility and balance.

It also encourages children in keeping active to boost their physical and mental health and general wellbeing and keeping the body strong and fit. There is overwhelming evidence that after a period of planned or unplanned rest, we are more at risk of injury during the transition back to training if load is not carefully managed. This means that as tempting as it is to leap into catch-up training, it may not end well.

The length of time it takes to build back up to full training is proportional to the length of the break and the amount of activity done during the break. For example, someone who has played on their iPad for the last ten weeks will need a lot longer to get back to full training than a child who has been running and doing individual drills the whole time. While this is hard to adjust in group training, it is worthwhile being aware of this fact and if you see your child struggling, the chances are that they are struggling and may need to be built back in a little more gradually over time to avoid injury and get the most out of them.

The way around this is to gradually build into the time and intensity of training over this next phase increasing by approximately 20% each week. Many will also have lost incidental strength. Gradually building skills and strength into their training over the next few weeks will be the safest way to get them back into action prior to unrestricted training being allowed.

For Redlands Junior School students, the plan is offer a wide variety of skills and drills to build them back up over the next three Wednesdays (27 May, 3 June and 10 June) during school hours. Our first session this week was enthusiastically welcomed by both staff and students; for me personally it was great to see students participating in various stations on the oval rather than me looking at them through a Zoom session.

Saturday Sport Reboot

As you would be aware an email was sent out to all families outlining the plan for the reboot of Redlands Saturday Sport. Those students who have not elected to play a representative Sport this season will participate in their return to Sport sessions on Wednesday 27 May, Wednesday 3 June and Wednesday 10 June during school hours. These sessions are in addition to any other specialist lesson including PE lessons that they may have scheduled on Wednesday. All students will remain on site for the next three weeks.

The School has been guided by the high-level descriptors of the Australian Institute of Sport’s three levels (Levels A, B, C) of activities and associated hygiene measures. More detailed descriptions of recommended Sport specific activities can be found here but specifically for Redlands Junior School Sport, these have been summarised in the table in the document emailed to you Monday 25 May. Students should not attend any session if have been unwell or had contact with a known or suspected case of COVID-19 in the last 14 days.

If you would like your child to participate in the Saturday Representative Sport sessions, please refer to this email for details and how to register, as numbers are limited.

Redlands House Courts Netball and Basketball Rings

In some exciting news for our students we have been making some enhancements to the outdoor courts next to Redlands House on Allister Street. The plan is to increase Junior School usage of these courts with training for Netball and Basketball, lunchtimes for a shoot around as well as using these courts for hosting home games once the season recommences. Thanks to the hard work of the Facilities team, in particular Theo and Richard, who installed all the new Netball rings (with nets) and Basketball rings in the pouring rain at the start of the week so that students could have early access to these. We have also removed the old Futsal metal goals from the courts, which has given us more space.

New AFL Jerseys

And continuing in the spirit of a fresh start out of lockdown, we have some new uniforms for our Junior School AFL teams for both our boys and girls teams for their representative season once it recommences. Modelled by some of Yr 6 players in the photo below, the jerseys will be loaned out to Junior School families for the season. We have also created new AFL shorts which students are required to purchase from the Uniform Shop. These are actual AFL shorts with no pockets, rather than the PE shorts which students have worn previously for AFL.

Redlands Pulse Revisit

In the coming days, all Redlands HomeFit documents and videos will be removed from the Junior School Sport page on Redlands Pulse. Replacing this will be a number of documents or information booklets which will assist you over the course of the year relating to all things sport. These include the following:

Redlands Junior School Package – great for new families or those wanting to see what Redlands Junior School Sport is about
Summer Sport Information book containing all information relevant to Summer Sports
Winter Sport Information book containing all information relevant to Winter Sports
Online Sport Documents directory for all online documents for all sport
Sport Uniforms booklet – full breakdown of required uniforms for each sport
Sport Carnivals – full breakdown of what is involved for our three major carnivals.

Mr Trevor Dunne
Head of Junior Sport
tdunne@redlands.nsw.edu.au
9953 6022