Generous local funds give Pewsey Primary School a smart & educational playground

British gold medal gymnast Kelly Simm, who is part of the Sports for Schools organisation, was at Pewsey Primary School on a very wet and windy Wednesday (November 28) to cut the ribbon to open their newly refurbished playground. 

The school has been raising money to replace the markings on their playground through PTA events, Tesco Bags for Life scheme, Waitrose Community Matters and the Co-op Community Fund.   In some heavy rain, Headteacher Nicola Gilbert thanked the donors and introduced Kelly to the assembled parents and Parish councillors.

 

   

The new thermo-plastic markings cost close to £9,000 and will last five years.  They include a 1-100 number square, a road layout for small bikes and scooters, a dart board design, an analogue-to-digital clock face and lots else besides. 

It’s a playground aimed at being a fun place to be and at the same time providing different ways to learn some essentials.  And there are more new elements for the playground still to come.

Kelly Simm spent the afternoon at the school – mainly in the dry.  She helped each class with a fitness circuit.  And then addressed the whole school in a special assembly – with a demonstration, a video and questions.

 

  

Were they good questions?  Kelly laughs: “They were really good questions starting with ‘How do you do it?’ and going on into how competitions work.”

Kelly, who is 23 and lives in Southampton, has taken part in her last competition for this year.  She starts again in February and March with the English and British championships – which will help her qualify for 2019’s European Championships and the World Championships in Stuttgart.  She is known for her consistency across the disciplines.

Kelly is the 2018 British all-round champion after a brilliant competition in Liverpool. In the apparatus finals she also took the title on the uneven bars.  She won team gold with England at the Commonwealth Games in 2014 and then  represented Great Britain at the European Championships before becoming World University Games all-round champion. Later in 2015 Kelly was part of the team that won bronze in Glasgow at the World Championships.

 

She obviously enjoyed talking to the children – and is a smiling role model for sport and fitness.