Plan Your Stress-free Sports Day

On your Marks, Get Set, Go:

Plan Your Stress-free Sports Day

Time to start balancing eggs on spoons, perfect those sack race skills and overcome all the obstacles to create the perfect Sports Day. In the first of this year’s Sports Day blogs we asked Jacqui Dalton, an experienced Primary School teacher, for her take on getting ready for the big event of the year. 

Sports Day ideas for primary schools

Sports Day in schools is almost upon us. If you ask any class what one of the highlights of their school year is you will find a lot of the children will say Sports Day. 

One of the best things about this annual event is that it can give those children who excel at sports, and maybe not so much with the more ‘academic’ subjects, a chance to shine. And if you get it right, you can make it fun for EVERYONE - even those who are a bit more reluctant about sport!

Structuring your Sports Day: Preparation is key

Being prepared is one of the most important parts of any successful Sports Day. This means starting your plans early, if possible, to establish if you have all the equipment you’ll need. NB: I know this is often easier said than done, when your days are filled with endless marking and expectations from every other area of the curriculum - but if you can do a bit of forward planning, it will make the overall organisation so much easier.

Go digging in the P.E. cupboard…

First things first...go digging about in the P.E. cupboard as this is often a hidden treasure trove of equipment! Look hard enough and, buried amongst the mountains of apparatus that hasn’t been put back properly, you can normally find a stockpile of suitable equipment for Sports Day.

If you are really lucky, your school might dedicate some staff meeting time so that every member of staff can pitch in to help and sort it out. If not, this job will probably fall to the P.E. Subject Leader. 

Order early…

If you do find that you need to order extra equipment, then doing this earlier will make your life easier. You can often take advantage of any discounts on equipment at this time of year which may not be available closer to ‘peak’ Sports Day time, and there will be no stress about it not arriving in time for the big day/event!

Remember, this is high stakes – stickers, certificates and medals are up for grabs and future Olympians could be spotted!

Start with… ‘The Essentials’

There are certain ‘essentials’ that every Sports Day needs, such as:

Or invest in a Mega Pack…

To make life even easier and stress-free, you could invest in a big pack, containing everything you’ll need to run your Sports Day at school. You can find our range here -> Sports Day resources and packs

Findel Everyday Mega Sports Day Pack

Mega packs like this Findel Mega Sports Day Pack are perfect because they are time-saving (you don’t need to order everything separately), cost-effective, compared to buying the items individually, and versatile – so you can mix and match the equipment to create extra races. I’ll give some ideas in a further blog … 

Make it run smoothly…let them practise!

The key to any successful Sports Day is organisation. It is a good idea to use some of your PE lesson time in the few weeks before your Sports Day to let the children, especially EY/KS1 children, practise the events so that they know how to actually run the races. Knowing what to expect can also be very helpful for any children who have difficulty with changes to their routine.

Discover more about activities you can run in my follow-up blog here - Plan your activities for Sports Day

Author: Jacqui Dalton

About: Jacqui was a primary school teacher for 18 years, a member of SLT and led a variety of subjects. She planned and delivered weekly P.E. lessons across KS1 and KS2 throughout her career as a teacher.

Jacqui is also one of the Education Specialists on the EuHu team, our teacher platform, containing a variety of curriculum content, including P.E. lessons. Find out more here https://www.euhu.co.uk/physical-education

​