Primary schoolchildren met to discuss how they can inspire their friends to take part in sport as part of the launch of two Erewash School Sport Partnership campaigns.
The partnership met with its young ambassadors from 12 primary schools to talk about how they can motivate their classmates now the new school year has started.
Girls chosen as ambassadors for the national This Girl Can campaign also gathered to talk about how they can get more girls involved in sport.
This Girl Can is a national campaign developed by Sport England and a wide range of organisations to celebrate women and girls across the country being active, no matter what they are doing and how well they are doing it.
Schools who attended the Erewash School Sport Partnership event, held at Kirk Hallam Community Academy, included Stanley St Andrew’s, Granby, St Thomas, Ashbrook Infant, Ashbrook Junior, Cloudside, Ladywood, Stanley Common, Field House, Mapperley, Hallam Fields and Dallimore.
Rhian Lilley, Erewash School Sport Partnership development manager, said it was great to see so many enthusiastic youngsters at the event.
She said: “We launched our new primary This Girl Can scheme and it’s the first time we’ve had ambassadors for This Girl Can from primary schools.
“They are a group of girls who are going to go back into their schools and encourage other girls to take part in school sports. We gave them ideas about noticeboard displays they could create and assemblies they could run. They also looked at Team GB athlete profiles and how they inspired others.
“We also met our young ambassadors, some of whom were new to the scheme, and we asked them to think about how they could use the Rio Olympics to encourage their friends to be active and take part in sport in and out of school.”
Children at the event were asked what their favourite Olympic moment was and to write a quote about anyone who inspired them to take part in sport.
Derrian Duro, 10, from Mapperley Primary School, wrote: “My family inspires me because they are with me every step of the way and they introduced me to my love of water sports. I do swimming, wakeboarding and kneeboarding.”
Lucy Haywood, from Dallimore Primary School, said: “We’ve got a brand new hall, new PE equipment and climbing frame in school so we are hoping that will inspire our children to be even more active. I think our pupils would also like to do an assembly talking about who inspires them.”
Pictured, pupils from Field House, Granby, Ladywood and St Thomas schools.