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YOU find a sport in school that you’re good at, and then you stick at it.

Sometimes you get children who are good at every game they turn their hands to, but it’s difficult to excel at a sport that you never had the opportunity to play.

PE lessons are traditionally made up of football, rugby, and, in the run up to sports day, maybe a bit of athletics – it is unlikely that you will have ever been handed a golf club and a tee by your teacher.

But that is all about to change. Since early last year, PGA professional Paul Rawlinson, from Barrow, has been spreading the message of Tri-Golf – a miniature version of golf designed specifically for young children at infant and primary schools.

A Level 3-qualified coach and recently-appointed England Golf coach, if anyone can teach children the perfect swing, then it is Paul.

“I think that all children should be encouraged to participate in a sport at a young age,” he says.

“Tri-Golf is a national game devised by the Golf Foundation, and I set up the local academy to deliver Tri-Golf in this area and have written a set of sessions to incorporate games and rewards.

“From our point of view, we encourage participation for all children and the feedback we have is that children who don’t participate in other sports enjoy the golf and the way we deliver it.

“I think it breeds a healthy lifestyle and we have seen children progress to proper golf because of it.”

The game, which can be played indoor or outdoor, from small halls to the biggest playing fields, uses plastic clubs and over-sized sponge balls.

So far, the Tri-Golf Academy has held sessions at 15 schools in and around South Cumbria, delivered by Keith Newton, secretary of Silecroft Golf Club, and Andrew Leece in the Millom area, Alyson Wood and her daughter Nicola from Furness Golf Club, and Gareth Butcher and Alex Walker from Dunnerholme Golf Club, as well as Paul himself.

He says: “I would like to take it to a stage where all schools in our area are using the Tri-Golf Academy as we are offering every school a free session for every class they have. We also have a London centre and just last week I had an enquiry from South Africa.

“Maybe in a few years all the schools in the country will have enjoyed a Tri-Golf session.

“From a proper golf point of view, if we can deliver golf to more young people then there should be a steady stream of new juniors wanting to play and all the good golfers I know were all junior members of their respective clubs.”

Not only is Tri-Golf serving the sport with the next generation of Lee Westwoods, it has many physical and mental benefits for the children as well.

On top of the health aspect and the acquisition of new technical skills, the programme is designed to incorporate elements of numeracy and literacy, as well as citizenship, now part of the national curriculum for secondary schools.

“Numeracy is the easiest one to incorporate,” says Paul.

“We use different points for the different games and incorporate the points system with any work the children might be doing at the time, for example, if they’re working on their five times table, then we work in units of five.

“Literacy is done similarly with some games that get the children to spell words from the cones they hit and they all get a skills award card to monitor their progress, which they have to record their results on.

“Golf is a game of honesty so we stress the need to be honest and have games that reward honesty.

“On the skills award card there is a section the children have to fill in after certain games that includes questions like ‘were you respectful to your teachers?’ and ‘did you listen carefully?’ – so with that we are guiding good citizenship.”

For more information on Tri-Golf in Cumbria, visit www.trigolf.co.uk and if your school is interested in a free Tri-Golf session email Paul Rawlinson on paul@trigolf.co.uk or phone 07968967148.

See the original article HERE

http://www.nwemail.co.uk/home/features/youngsters-tee-off-1.798217?referrerPath=home/2.3320