Howzat! to give extra boost to cricket in schools

The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), in partnership with Channel 4, today launched Howzat!, its latest development initiative designed to promote cricket to children in schools. The event, at St Paul's Way Community School in Bow, East London, was supported by Kate Hoey, Minister for Sport, and David Taylor, Director of Inspections for OFSTED.

After over 15 months development work, two education resource packs have been produced, 'Howzat! 1st Innings' for Primary Schools and 'Howzat! 2nd Innings' for Secondary schools. In all, 30,000 packs will be produced for free distribution amongst schools in England and Wales.

Lord MacLaurin, ECB Chairman, commented, "The launch of the Howzat! education resource packs represents the England & Wales Cricket Board's most significant and important development initiative since the inception of the ECB in 1997."

Complying with government recommendations for Curriculum 2000, Howzat! will enable teachers to deliver cricket to children across the education curriculum.

Suggested lesson plans and ideas will encourage teachers to introduce cricket into mainstream subjects, such as Mathematics, English and Science. In addition, cricket teaching methods will be suggested for all areas of PE activity.

Keith Pont, ECB's Director of Development, said, "Cricket can be introduced into the classroom in many different ways. In Mathematics, children could calculate averages, run rates and work with cricket statistics, for example. Studying contrasting writing styles of newspaper match reports could introduce cricket into English lessons, or a Science class could look at understanding how a ball swings or spins."

Education specialists, practising teachers and curriculum advisers, as well as cricket coaches, have all been heavily involved in the development of the resource to ensure that it is of genuine relevance and help in today's classrooms. The packs will be highly user-friendly so that teachers without an in-depth knowledge of cricket will also be able to benefit.

Lengthy research has ensured that education for disabled children is also incorporated into the packs, thus underlining ECB's commitment to make cricket accessible to all.

A total of 25,000 Howzat! 1st Innings packs will be produced to cover the 19,893 Primary Schools in England and Wales, and 5,000 Howzat! 2nd Innings packs will be produced in CD-ROM form to cover the 3,940 Secondary Schools. They will be distributed free of charge.

Distribution of the resource packs will be targeted at teachers who show a genuine interest in receiving and using the information. County Boards and their cricket development officers will be responsible for their distribution through a mixture of coaching visits to schools, INSET (In-Service Education Training) courses, and tailor-made courses for teacher training colleges.

Kate Hoey, Minister for Sport, said, "I very much welcome the ECB's Howzat! education resource packs which should provide invaluable to primary and secondary teachers, and will help to generate interest in cricket among young boys and girls. Investment in the grassroots development of cricket is incredibly important and the Howzat! initiative is further demonstration of the ECB's strong commitment to this policy."

David Brook, Director of Strategy and Development at Channel 4, said "We are committed at Channel 4 to reinvigorating and rejuvenating cricket both on and off screen, and this joint initiative is a vital part of our investment to encourage and build the game from grass-roots level."

Designed for Key Stage 2 of the National Curriculum, Howzat! 1st Innings has two sections: 'Playing The Game' and 'In The Classroom'.

'Playing the Game' supports teachers in delivering aspects of the National Curriculum relating to Games Activities in Physical Education. It is designed to ensure that the absolute newcomer to teaching cricket is able to derive as much pleasure and satisfaction from this resource as the experienced coach. To achieve this view and advice have been taken from the world of education as well as cricket.

'Playing the Game' is designed to provide all the fun that Key Stage 2 pupils need, combined with basic technical information to help broaden their natural skills.

'In the Classroom' uses the fun of cricket to deliver an exciting range of exercises to support the Key Stage 2 Curriculum for English, Mathematics, Science, ICT, Design & Technology, History, Geography, Art & Design and the framework for PSHE.

As with 'Playing the Game', the material for 'In the Classroom' has been developed and tested by practising teachers and is designed to be as flexible as possible. It can be used to support teaching in a variety of subject areas and the exercises can be adapted to suit children of varying abilities.

Howzat! 2nd Innings, will be produced in CD-ROM format to reflect the increased technology used in Secondary School education. Providing much the same information as Howzat! 1st Innings, it is however targeted at Key Stages 3 & 4.

The CD-ROM will include computer-animated graphics, photographic stills and video footage for coaching purposes. It will be possible to download all material for use in the classroom. In this way, teachers will be able to custom-build their own lesson plan from a menu of suggested ideas. Furthermore, internet hotlinks will direct teachers to cricket related web-sites to provide additional assistance.

For further information:
ECB: Mark Hodgson / Andrea Wiggins, tel: 020 7432 1200.
Channel 4: Tom Foster, tel: 020 7306 5545.