Primary schools to get up to £9,000 to spend on PE lessons (From York Press)

Primary schools to get up to £9,000 to spend on PE lessons

9:20am Tuesday 19th March 2013 in News By Dan Bean, dan.bean@thepress.co.uk

A NEW scheme which will grant primary schools in York and North and East Yorkshire thousands of pounds to pay for sports and specialist PE lessons has been welcomed.

The Government scheme will see £150 million per year spent on primary school sports around the country, with individual schools receiving about £8,000.

Ollie Holliday is a former head of PE and the managing director of Total Sports Limited, which has worked in primary schools around the city since 1996, including Popppleton Ousebank, Hempland, St. Barnabas, Westfield and St Oswald's, as well as primary schools in Harrogate and Leeds.

Ollie said: “The funding goes directly to the head teacher or the school, about £8,000 or £9,000 for an average-sized school, and they can decide how they are going to improve sporting provision at their facilities.

“This means class teachers don’t have to do PE. They could be 60-year-old women taking 30 children out for football, so they can be doing some marking while we come in and do the lesson.”

Total Sports work to the curriculum requirements, and lessons are planned specifically for primary school children's development, with Ofsted last month grading them as good to 0utstanding for their teaching and the children’s learning.

Ollie said: “I think this will make a massive difference to sport in this country as starting at grassroots level is something I believe is the best way to instil a love of sport in children for life.

“This is wonderful news, we already teach PE in primary schools and provide specialist coaching during the school day to more than 5,000 York pupils every week and we have seen a great increase in their skills, confidence and enjoyment of sport.”