On Monday 2nd March, I volunteered to referee a netball match at my placement school (Weetwood Primary). I have been assisting at the weekly netball club after school each Friday and this was a good opportunity to see how the school organised matches.
Netball is not a sport I have been involved in much before and I have only picked up the rules from watching the teacher deliver the games at the club, so this was a good chance for me to test my knowledge of a new sport. Whilst refereeing I had chance to watch both teams, so in the breaks between each quarter I gave the team some key points to work on for the next quarter in order to try to win the game. This was very helpful for me as most of my coaching has been done within sessions and I rarely get the chance to coach in a more competitive environment.
This experience will help me in the future as it has given me a better idea of how coaching in a competitive environment may differ from coaching in a session. As well as this, I have improved my understanding of the organisation of a netball game, which gives me another sport to add to my repertoire of sports I am confident in coaching and organising. This could give me the edge when going for a job as a primary school PE coordinator as a huge part of that job is organising fixtures and events in a range of different sports.
Nathan Westwell - Coaching Blog 