From keeping bug-free, having cool drinks and maintaining food stations to setting up party tables, playing music and adding that extra bit of fun!

Here are some of our favourite hacks:

• To shoo bugs away, cut lemons in half, mix them with cloves, and put them in martini glasses. Put one glass on each table to drive those insects away;
• Instead of plain ice, you can use frozen fruits such as berries. This way, your drinks won’t get watered down. Not only that, the fruits add an extra oomph to your drinks!;
• For chopped fruits and salads, put each serving in nicely-printed individual plastic cups. To make things much cooler, you can use ice cream cones or nacho cups as edible fruit salad containers!;
• If you want your party to be fun and memorable, serve it with good music. Take out those dusty records and bring life to the party!  To amplify your phone, you can place it in a glass or cup.

For even more ideas on the extra fun bit, try some of the games in our free resources, such as the activities in the Star Chart and Ultimate Frisbee Challenges :)

Have a great summer!!

If you would like to enquire about A-Star Sports and Sports Xtra activities in your area, drop us a line below (if your area doesn’t appear in the drop down menu, let us know your postcode as we’re expanding all the time and would be happy to get back to you with details):

The post Outdoor summer fun appeared first on A-Star Sports.

– Lack of exercise contributes to diseases that cost Europe over 80 billion Euros every year;

– A quarter of European adults are insufficiently active;

– The direct cost of treating inactivity-related disorders is over €9 billion per year;

– Physical inactivity is the 4th leading risk factor for global mortality.

‘Now we move’ further said:

“Within a few decades, physical inactivity has become one of the leading risks to European citizens’ well-being and a growing challenge for European economies. But despite increasing evidence of dramatic health and economic costs associated with physical inactivity, we still lack sufficient initiatives to reverse this negative trend.”

So, let’s get moving! Just like the kids we coach, quite often a key reason for us grown-ups not to get active is the fun factor.  That’s why we need to pull together and find activities that we can enjoy as families.  On our free resources page, you can find our Star Chart Challenge, our Ultimate Frisbee Challenge and, if you’re thinking of organising a fabulous activity-packed get-together, there’s even some great tips in our Parent’s Guide to Hosting a Children’s Birthday Party – who says it needs to be a party, you can use some the same tips for small events?!?!

You can read more about the difference that activity for periods of just 20 minutes a day can make or find out more on Twitter #InactivityTimeBomb:

And you can find lots of suggestions here to get moving and have fun :)

Ten tips on getting active with your kids – NHS

Play for life – kids’ indoor and outdoor activities

101 ways to keep you and your kids moving

If you would like to enquire about A-Star Sports and Sports Xtra activities in your area, drop us a line below (if your area doesn’t appear in the drop down menu, let us know your postcode as we’re expanding all the time and would be happy to get back to you with details):

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You can read the article for The ID Band Company here: ‘Keeping children safe this Spring during sports’

As with all blog articles, there’s a lot more that goes into the research behind the scenes, so here you can read the full interview:

Dealing with children’s health conditions and allergies

Do you get many children with health conditions at your clubs and camps?
Most recently, 8-12% of the children attending have had a recorded health condition.

What is your procedure for dealing with their health conditions?
We ask parents to fill out registration forms for us that ask for clear details on health conditions. Once we are alerted to these then we speak directly to the family to make sure that we have a full understanding of the condition and any protocols they have in place for dealing with it. If a child is at a club where their parent or guardian doesn’t need to be present, we also ask for additional written consent to deal with any prescribed medication. Where a condition requires a parent to be there at all times, then we make sure that this is possible. All coaches have paediatric first aid training.

Are meals provided on your holiday clubs?
Children are generally asked to bring their own packed lunch but fresh fruit is often made available at snack times.

If so how do you cater for children with food allergies?
A daily allergy check is carried out to ensure that the fruit available is suitable for everyone. Coaches are regularly notified of all health conditions of the children in attendance, so that interactions at lunch times can also be monitored.

Introducing sports and physical activity

Would you recommend that children play sports?
Yes, it is part of our vision to make sport and physical activity fun and accessible for every child.

What are the health benefits?
Taking part in sport and physical activity brings many benefits from the physical fitness that can support children’s growth and development, through to living a healthy lifestyle into adulthood, improving concentration levels, self-esteem and confidence. It’s also an extremely positive thing to do with family and friends, developing social skills and a strong support network.

Are there other psychological benefits of playing sports?
As mentioned above, sport and physical activity are beneficial for self-esteem and confidence as well as social skills and learning to work with others. It’s also a fun way to learn how to deal with challenges in a supportive environment and developing lots of skills that are transferable to many other situations in life.

What sports would you recommend for a child that hasn’t participated much before?
I would actually recommend trying as many sports as possible! Sport isn’t just what we see on popular television channels like football and even rugby, it’s dodgeball, volleyball, handball, basketball, ultimate frisbee and many more. Being a multi-sports coach, I see many children new to sport come along and really experience a journey of discovery and develop a genuine and sustainable interest in a sport that captures their imagination.

Are some sports classes you run seasonal? If so, which classes are now available?
As a network across the UK, we run regular weekly multi-sports classes, after school clubs, holiday clubs and parties. The offering in each of the 40+ franchise territories varies but is a mixture of multi-sports and physical activity ‘Xperiences’.

Health conditions

In your experience are some sports better suited for children with asthma/respiratory conditions than others?
With experienced coaches who can build on adapted games with a full knowledge of children’s conditions, all sports can be made accessible to children. The emphasis here is on adapted games. I would also stress that by ‘sports’ I mean land sports – I couldn’t comment on water sports!

Can children with respiratory conditions still participate fully in sports?
I would say yes as long as:
– they have the full consent of their GP and parent/guardian;
– their parent/guardian has communicated and prepared for their needs with the coach;
– they are participating in sports/activities adapted for their age group/developmental stage;
…and, should there be a need to accommodate children with adapted activities, shorter sessions and/or longer recovery times, then this should be part of the offering from the coach and detailed in their planning.

What safety precautions do you have in place for when they are participating?
Clear records, safely stored, labelled and easily accessible medications (where appropriate i.e. prescribed medications for particular children), first aid trained staff, good relationships with the children so communication is clear and well planned activities.  And parents on hand in particular cases where children need specialist support outside of our training.

Do you recommend/know of any breathing techniques for asthmatics?

I don’t recommend any in particular as each child has their own preferences and this is discussed with their parent/guardian. However, alongside this we always make sure to remain calm, speak positively, remove any stresses, provide reassurance and make sure that every child knows that we know exactly how to take care of them.

Changing weather conditions

Have you found that changing weather conditions can affect children with asthma/allergies?
This is certainly something that has been reported to us by parents and that we have seen as coaches. This has occasionally resulted in limited time outdoors, for example, particularly in relation to grass or pollen allergies, the potential for very severe reactions to insect bites/stings and sometimes related to damp conditions.

Do you have any safety precautions to combat this?
Yes – again, this is to do with planning alternatives (in some cases indoor instead of outdoor activities), having a full knowledge of a child’s medical history and any necessary medications to hand where applicable.

Do many of your summer club activities take place outdoors?
Some of our multi-sports sessions and particular sport-related ‘Xperiences’ are held outdoors (e.g. a playing field, astroturf etc) as well as physical activity ‘Xperiences’ such as ‘Adventure’, which can involve shelter building and tracking outdoors.

If so, how do children with hayfever, allergies, asthma and other respiratory conditions deal with this?
As described above – parents dropping their children off will provide any updates on a child’s current condition, advise on the best support for the child and sign across labelled prescribed medications and the permissions for these to be used as appropriate. Children will often talk to us about how they’re feeling and this open communication is used to make sure children are well or to take action if they start showing or reporting symptoms.

Do you have any advice for sufferers on how to cope during changing weather conditions?
Keep a record of how the change in weather conditions seems to affect you and share this. With this knowledge, family members, friends and coaches can provide great support. Even the smallest of tweaks to a planned outing or sports session can make a big difference.

Click here to enquire about and book Sports Xtra courses.  For A-Star Sports enquiries, please use the form below:

The post Keeping children safe this Spring during sports appeared first on A-Star Sports.

Keeping all children and young people safe while participating in youth sports is something in which everyone involved with sports organisations needs to participate. Creating a safe, fun and secure environment often begins with coaches and volunteers.

The best volunteer and youth coach sports training programmes incorporate four critical elements, including; anti bullying policies, concussion training, recognising signs of abuse, and criminal records checks.

All coaches and volunteers of youth sports leagues and teams should consider training on the following topics to know to keep children as safe as possible.

Anti-bullying training and policy implementation

Increasingly, bullying is prevalent on sports fields and in the daily lives of children and adolescents. Bullying has a significant impact on the emotional and overall functioning of children making it critical that youth sports leagues take steps to tackle this problem head on.

By training and supporting your coaches, volunteers, and parents when it comes to anti bullying, you can promote a culture of vigilance in your youth sports organisation, which can make all the difference in safeguarding children. Experts at Bullying UK and Family Lives have endorsed a number of professionally authored online learning programmes focusing on duty of care issues.

These programmes also explain how to identify bullying behaviour, what to do about it, and how to ensure best practices in your sports organisation. By taking these steps towards a more educated youth sports community, bullying will be minimised, if not completely eradicated.

Finally, it’s worth noting that although most coaches use affirming and encouraging coaching styles, bullying behaviour such as demeaning, shaming, and name-calling remains a concerningly common aspect of coaching in sports at any level. Anti-bullying policies and education play an important role in eliminating any and all demeaning behaviour.

Concussion screening and training

During a sport-related concussion incident, coaches, volunteers and athletic trainers are often the first responders. To be most effective as one of the first responders on the scene, knowing your athletes before the season is very important. At the beginning of each season, coaches, volunteers and athletic trainers should assess the athlete’s concussion history and administer baseline concussion testing.

Not only can this assessment greatly help manage a concussion if it ever occurs, but the very act of getting tested will raise concussion awareness for athletes, parents and coaches.

This communication and screening is important because studies have shown that many athletes do not report concussion symptoms to coaches, parents and trainers because they do not know what the symptoms feel like. Training coaches and athletes about concussions and concussion symptoms is very important to keep youth athlete safe.

Knowing and recognising signs of abuse

Youth sports coaches are in a unique position to help recognise the symptoms of child abuse. Child abuse most frequently occurs in the home and the perpetrator is typically a member of the family. Sadly, the vast majority of abuse goes unreported.

While there are numerous warning signs exhibited by children who have been abused or molested, the majority of these signs are emotional and can be difficult to detect. While rare, physical warning signs should be reported immediately. The less-obvious presence of signs such as depression, anxiety, sudden changes in eating habits or self-mutilation should be taken seriously and the child should be closely monitored.

Again, training here is critical because when coaches and volunteers know what to look for, they are better able to step in and help when necessary.

Checking for criminal records

Concerns about youth sports organisations screening coaches for criminal history has intensified in recent months. While background investigation is not required for all youth sports teams, any time numerous volunteers are lined up it is a good idea to have an evaluation process for volunteers at which the background checks can be done to reduce the team and oranisation’s liability.

Youth-based sports programmes should try to screen out people with a criminal past that makes them unsuitable for working with children. There are a number of organisations worldwide who offer simple and cost-effective background checks online. At a minimum, violent and sex offenders or anyone with an extensive criminal past could cause irreparable damage to a sports organisation and the individual athletes and should be screened out from the beginning.

About the author

Keir McDonald MBE is founder and Director of EduCare, an online training solutions company that specialises in child protection, exploitation and online safety, and bullying and child neglect. EduCare is associated with both Kidscape and Family Lives and customers include over 4000 schools and colleges and 12000 pre-schools as well as councils, NHS, charities and more.

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A-Star Sports coaches have enhanced DBS checks, first aid qualifications, have achieved or are currently striving for Level 2 coaching certificates or above and receive child protection/safeguarding children and positive child behaviour management training, supported by the associated best practice policies and procedures.

To enquire about weekly classes, holiday clubs and parties in your area, you can find local details and contact a franchisee directly here or contact us using the form below:

The post Keeping safe in sport: child protection training for coaches and volunteers appeared first on A-Star Sports.

Over the holidays, hundreds of children aimed to achieve at least 30 physical activity and healthy living stars in order to have fun, keep active and try new things. Families were provided with lots of ideas in a free eBook and downloadable reward chart.

Children and their families took part in over 70 different activities from football, basketball and rugby through to climbing, rollerskating and cyclocross (pictured in the word cloud image above). They tried a variety of different fruits and vegetables and positive adjustments to their family lives. One pre-schooler reported: “I walked around the walls of Chester, walked around Chester Zoo, walked up to the cliffs at Loggerheads country park, made a snowman and had a snowball fight, scootered to the park, went swimming, knocked down the snowman and collected sticks to make it into a snow hedgehog. And, I tried a parsnip on Christmas day!” (Adam B., aged 4)

Some of the children even recorded an achievement of over 90 stars in just a two week period.

Parents have been delighted with the outcomes, too:

“We had good fun over the holidays working hard to earn stars. This was a brilliant idea and we enjoyed finding different ways to fill in our chart. We even started filling in a second chart and Ashley has become very helpful around the house! Thank you.”
Caroline H.

“Many, many thanks for the Star Chart Challenge. What a fab idea! We were having great trouble getting our three year old daughter to sleep. My son was filling some stars in when he suggested that Lottie would be able to colour in five stars if she went to bed without a fuss and with no waking up. It worked! The next evening she got four stars, then three and we haven’t looked back since. Thanks from us all for the now very peaceful nights.”
Emma A.

As touched upon in our previous blog post, research suggests that children are ‘primarily motivated by pleasure, play and the sheer joy of movement’, so providing more opportunities to experience these (like the Star Chart Challenge) can help to cement positive habits that inspire the whole family.

The Star Chart Challenge resources are free to everyone and can be downloaded on our free resources page.

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The Star Chart Challenge activities word cloud was created using WordItOut and can be found at: http://worditout.com/word-cloud/672258

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For more information about A-Star Sports, please don’t hesitate to contact us:

The post Reaching for the stars – sports in the park, sleeping better and eating parsnips appeared first on A-Star Sports.

The benefits of reward charts

Reward charts can be particularly powerful in:

• encouraging wanted behaviour
• discouraging unwanted behaviour
• highlighting the positive benefits of trying new things / practising new skills
• learning how to set goals
• teaching responsibility
• providing children with a visible progress tracker

Positive reinforcement of desired behaviour is an effective approach to changing how we do things for the better, whether you’re 3 or 93! Even as coaches over the last year, for example, we’ve used pedometers to track and record steps, apps to monitor a balanced healthy diet and heart monitors to guage and record effort and intensity. A lot of these devices compare our activity, provide feedback and help us to adjust our actions accordingly in a very similar way to how we as coaches and parents help children to set goals and achieve them through reward charts.

Reward chart challenges

Keeping a balanced view, it’s useful to consider two common pitfalls! The notion of using too much praise, particularly when a child’s goal becomes the praise rather than the behavioural outcome* and why, as helpfully outlined by the Raising Children Network, ‘a reward for good behaviour isn’t the same as bribing your child. The difference is that a bribe is given before the behaviour you want, and a reward is given after. Rewards reinforce good behaviour, but bribes don’t.’**

Motivating children

Research suggests that children are primarily motivated by pleasure, play and the sheer joy of movement***, so providing more opportunities to experience these will help to cement positive habits that not only inspire children but also us grown-ups as well. This is why the team at A-Star Sports has created the Star Chart Challenge, a reward chart and accompanying eBook to provide ideas and inspiration towards more fun physical activity and healthy living choices. These resources are free to everyone and can be downloaded on our free resources page – available from 01/12/14.

So, set some goals, try some new things and have a whole heap of fun in the process :)

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* http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/smart-moves/201411/the-problem-praise

** http://raisingchildren.net.au/articles/reward_charts.html

*** http://talkingeducationandsport.blogspot.de/2014/11/positive-early-experiences-of-sport.html

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Buying and starting up

• franchise fee
• capital investment
• working capital
• professional service fees

Ongoing costs

• management service fees
• marketing levy
• necessary purchases
• additional training

The franchise agreement / renewal and resale

• how the franchisor/franchisee relationship works with respect to rights and obligations, most often within a given geographical territory or location;
• the provision of goods and services from the franchisor to the franchisee;
• financial terms;
• how long the initial agreement is for and what happens at renewal time;
• the sale of an established franchise;
• expected practice with relation to the trademark and brand;
• any future adaptations to the franchise system;
• how to end an agreement.

For a more detailed definition of terms and how they fit in to your business you can read the full ‘Money well spent’ article here.

Franchise businesses have an increased chance of success compared to independent start-ups

In an article for The Guardian this year (Too many startups fail), Theo Paphitis said, “50% of all small businesses fail in the first couple of years. It’s a damning statistic but it’s true.” Franchising is significantly different – four in five new franchises are profitable within two years. Additionally, findings from the 2013 NatWest/British Franchise Association franchise survey show a total UK economic contribution of £13.7 billion, which is indicative of the power of franchising systems and their proven business formats.

Visit our ‘Become a franchise owner’ page to find out more about A-Star Sports franchises and/or drop us a line on the form below:

The post Setting up a franchise – an easy overview appeared first on A-Star Sports.

Find your local A-Star Sports here or send us your enquiry below:

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Self-esteem in children

For small children, there are some key themes that A-Star Sports coaches keep to the fore to ensure that building self-esteem is amongst the top priorities:

• coaching styles are positive at all times;
• activities are fun, accessible and inclusive;
• a fresh and enthusiastic approach is paramount for bringing a wide variety of activities to life, including considered developments for children to learn at their own pace;
• positive physical and social experiences – and the skills developed as a result – are transferable beyond the sporting environment;
• communication is always at an appropriate level and interactions are engaging and individual (coaches know, for example, children’s names, families and favourite games and can show a genuine interest in each child’s reflections and learning).

In his article ‘Do Sports and Other Physical Activities Build Self-Esteem? Early positive experiences of sports develop healthy, confident players’, Dr Richard Bailey rightly comments that ‘children are not mini-adults’. With communication in mind, the adjustments that we make as coaches of young children in this regard can make a huge difference in a child’s enjoyment of and longer term participation in sport and physical activity. It’s also one of the key factors in how the media can have a positive impact and support the notion of a lasting legacy from major sporting events.

Sport and the media

Over the last few years, so many of the coaches and parents we have encountered at A-Star Sports have done an amazing job in ‘translating’ the media’s reporting of big events like London 2012, the Winter Olympics, the Commonwealth Games and the Football World Cup. Children learn from the genuine emotions around these sporting events – from anticipation and excitement through to patience, perseverance and even disappointment.

The rollercoaster of emotions that contributes to self-esteem is also often captured in onscreen characters that reach out to children. This summer’s sporty animated film for children – The Unbeatables – does just that. In fact, like effective coaches, it targets its audiences very carefully and delivers important themes and messages on one level to children and on another to the grown-ups with them! Thus emphasising that children are indeed ‘not mini adults’ and that adults can see things very differently to children.

The right message

As adults we can see that ‘[involvement] in team sports has been positively associated with social acceptance and a sense of belonging, especially where such involvement is characterised by positive coaching, progressive skill development and peer support’ (Psychology Today*). To keep building self esteem, though, we need to remember – like the film makers – exactly who our target audience is and how to ‘translate’ the most valuable messages accordingly.

*Do Sports and Other Physical Activities Build Self-Esteem? Early positive experiences of sports develop healthy, confident players | Published on August 7, 2014 by Richard Bailey, Ph.D. in Smart Moves | http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/smart-moves/201408/do-sports-and-other-physical-activities-build-self-esteem

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Although carried out in the 1950s, the study cut 15 hours of formal lessons a week and replaced them with physical activities.  The results, as described by Dr Richard Bailey for Psychology Today, were quite something:  ‘Despite the loss of more than a quarter of their classroom teaching time, the academic grades of the experimental group did not worsen, and in many cases actually improved. What’s more, the teachers reported fewer discipline problems, greater attentiveness in class and less absenteeism.”

There is an added note of caution, namely that this was a small-scale study (though it did use a control group) and wasn’t subjected to peer review and other checks and balances.

However, although many questions remain, the article points out that it is ‘worth noting that numerous studies have found that physically fit children tend to outperform their less fit peers’.

Clearly, there is much research still to be done to provide more definitive guidance but it is without question that physical activities that are made fun, exciting, inclusive and varied can do more than just improve our physical health.

The full article – Learning to move, moving to learn? – can be found here.

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