Coaching Kids with Special Needs

Coaching kids with special needs

I’ve been working part time with difficult kids, acting as an angling coach for two years now and am thoroughly enjoying every minute of the ‘work’.

I left full time teaching in 2004 after two spells of long term illness due to stress. Ten years as a deputy head teacher was enough! I saw an advertisement in the local teaching paper for a part-time youth worker on a fishing course, run by West Sussex County Council, and pioneered by Trevor Passmore at Passies Ponds in Lancing West Sussex.

As a lifelong sea angler I jumped at the chance. I supported a coach called Tom Clark, who showed me the ropes, being a fully qualified PAA coach. After lots of encouragement, and with the backing of Trev Passmore, and a great deal of trepidation I applied for the PAA Coaches’ course up at Evesham. Surrounded by ‘experts’ I took the course and went on a near vertical learning curve with a dozen or so other guys from very mixed backgrounds. I think it fair to say we mixed and studied very well as a group and I made some very good mates who taught me loads and were very sympathetic to me being the only sea angler on the course. Backed up with only the things I’d been taught by Tom Clark and the guys on the course, and my teaching experience I managed to get through the course, using my mullet fishing experiences to back up my lack of practical coarse angling skills.

Later that year I was employed by West Sussex County Council as a fully fledged angling instructor and have, with fantastic support from my youth worker Anne, managed to develop the Fishing in the Community programme into a sea and coarse fishing experience for the kids.

Now the kids….. there’s a story!

Many have challenging behaviour and have been expelled from school, some are dyslexic, dyscalculaic, some are angling fanatics, some keen to learn. They are from a huge range of backgrounds and experiences ranging from being in care, to coming from wealthy parents. The whole bloomin’ lot!

We fish once a week, meeting in Lancing, depending upon weather and tidal conditions either fishing at Passies Ponds or from the beaches of Lancing/Shoreham or the breakwater at Shoreham. Usually the youth worker fishes as well, as we have no need for any behaviour controls. The kids are great……transformed by the great outdoors. Fish , I admit, sometimes are the icing on the cake, that make a good day great. Every primary/secondary school in the country should have a tame angling coach on the staff, to get the kids fishing in all weathers, away from the classroom, as part of extracurricular activities. It would give those kids, written off by the system, a chance to prove themselves capable and to get accreditation for their fishing studies through courses like the Open College Network, Fishing in the Community scheme.

I think it important to say that in two years of this work, I’ve only had cross words with one lad; who threatened us physically (for offering him ‘non-designer’/un chavvy wet weather gear) for trying to help him. Apparently he’d pick a fight with himself in an empty room anyway!

He got wet and walked offsite in a torrential downpour calling all of the rest of us ‘mugs’ as we settled into a fishing CD and the real mugs were filled with hot chocolate. Hmm who’s the mug?

Anyway, fishing is developing well into next year with coaching opportunities cropping up all over the coastal stretch of West Sussex.

If I have the time and anyone shows any interest I’d be happy to post again and tell a few funny stories about the lads and their exploits, their stories and successes.

I’m also looking for some backing from any companies out there who are keen to promote angling for youth, etc.

I’ve had support from Gemini Tackle, Terry Carrol at ZZiplex, The Brighton Angler in Brighton and, of course, Trevor Passmore at Passies Ponds without whom none of this would ever have happened.