On Thursday 17^th July, the Cobblers Study Centre held its end of term presentation evening in the Sixfields Stadium. The presentation evening gave an opportunity to over one hundred parents and teachers to celebrate the success of young learners who had taken part in the Playing for Success scheme.  The Study Centre uses the environment and medium of football as a motivational tool to help raise literacy, numeracy and ICT standards amongst KS2 and KS3 pupils throughout Northamptonshire.  

This presentation evening was particularly notable as it was the first to include children from Daventry schools that had attended the Study Centre for the first time.  These schools were The Grange, Ashby Fields, Southbrook Junior, Falconers Hill and Raeburn.

The presentation evening included a showing of photos of the children at work over the last ten weeks.  Three representative of the Cobblers Youth Team assisted Study Centre Manager Jean Limpitlaw in presenting certificates and football goody bags to participants of the scheme.  The youth players also posed for photographs and signed autographs.  The young learners were also treated to a surprise visit from the official Cobblers mascot Clarence.

Thank you to all pupils and mentors who have taken part in the Playing for Success scheme this term for making it a success.  All staff at the Study Centre are looking forward to kicking off a new term in September. 

Students from Sponne School spent the day in the Study Centre today. They took part in a number of activities including a stadium tour, team building games, stadium orienteering and ICT comic strips. The day was very successful and some of the students made the following blog contributions: 

My day at the study centre was really good. I got really wet when we were outside. It would have been better if it wasn’t raining, but I still had a lot of fun. Annon

Today we went to the Cobblers Study Centre and it was great. Everyone enjoyed themself. We saw the players train and we looked around the football ground. - Leanne 

George Husbands - I really enjoyed coming to the study centre because we did loads of thing like……Stadium tours, team games, watch the players train, go on computers and XBOX 360!!

I don’t think anybody that comes here goes home unhappy.

Hi I am Jessica Mouton for a school in Towcester and I have came here to have a

Good day out at Cobbler’s stadium to have a tour around there. It is sooooooo big.I saw some players one of them was called Wesley and aswell when I was walking around the stadium. We went into their changing room and we saw a lonely little spider in their ice bath that they fill with ice to un-tense their muscles.

I really enjoyed the day at the Cobblers Study Centre, having a stadium tour, using the computers, also watching the 1^st team train in gruesome weather.

 So if anyone comes here it will be a brilliant time and you will go home with loads to say!    Robson Kightley

 Today was GREAT I really enjoyed it. The games were good fun because we all had to communicate with each other which made it quite hard. The best part was the tour when we got taken around the stadium and got to watch the Cobblers train.

By Demi Hillyard

My day out to Cobblers study centre was awesome I got to go all around the Cobblers Stadium and got to talk to Andy Holt. I then got to watch all the team train including my favourite player Jason Crowe. He is well good! My day out to the Cobblers Study Centre was wicked. - Callum Townsend

I really enjoyed my time at the study centre.

My favourite bit about it was the tour of the stadium because we got to see all around the rooms and the dungeons, where my friends locked me in for a little joke. And my other favourite bit was watching the Cobblers train on the training pitch.

By Harry Peters

Volunteering as a Mentor at the Cobblers Study Centre is continuing to be an extremely rewarding experience. Thirteen students walk in through the doors on the first day of their experience here, shy and uncertain of what to expect. In a few short weeks the students charge through the doors, excited about their new challenges. It is my pleasure as a mentor to be a friend to these students, helping them to improve their Literacy, Numeracy and ICT skills through games and challenges. As some of these students have never experienced using a computer before it is wonderful that they are learning these new skills. Orienteering, Smoothie making and the Club Challenge are just a few of the experiences which I am proud to be a part of, supporting, guiding and building confidence in the students which will last throughout life. I have made some wonderful friends in the students who I have supported, many who feel sad on their final departure from our centre, and the staff here continue to make my work fulfilling and enjoyable.

Gail Taylor - Student at the University of Northampton

I loved coming to the cobblers it has been a great few days out!!!! My computer skills have improved the most but also my English and a little math. The best part of coming to the study centre was that we were always doing something fun but while we were, we were always learning something, while having fun!!! I’m sure we’ve all had a great time as I have had a fantastic time with all the helpers - Emma, Jean, Margaret, Matthew, Gail. Here is a picture of all of us in the study centre!!!

Leonie - Falconers Hill

The Prince’s Trust Northampton North Team 28 have been working on a 12 week Personal Development Course. This involves a City and Guilds award in individual team work, community skills award, key skills in working with others improving own learning, performance and problem solving. The team have tackled many challenges over the 12 weeks including induction, an outward bound residential where they all completed activities such as abseiling, rock climbing, completing a Tyrolean traverse, weasling and problem solving. Fundraising for their community project on week 3 where the team raised over £750 for their project at Fairfields School for children with multi - sensory disabilities. Darren Norton from Northampton town visited our team room to deliver a healthy lifestyle session. During weeks 4, 5 and 6 the team completed the project at Fairfields School, redeveloping a memorial garden for children that had died at the school and designing an underwater themed hallway leading to the swimming pool. Week 6 also involved our first visit to Northampton Town Football Club’s Study Centre were the team completed CV’s, application forms and had the use of all the computer facilities. A very big thank you to Jean for all your help. During week 7 and 8 the team undertook a variety of work placements and week 9 was the next step involving interview techniques, employment requirements and preparing us for finding full time employment. Week 10 was our team challenge where our team visited Vitalise - a holiday centre for disabled adults. This had a major impact on our team with many team members already booked in for future visits. During week 11 we returned to Northampton town football club for a coaching session with Darren Norton which helped to improve our team work skills, unfortunately none of us made it into the first team! Once again we had the use of the Study Centre to help us prepare our scripts for our final presentation which will be held at Northampton Town Football Club on Wednesday the 16^th July.

Danielle Houlton – Princes Trust Team 28

For further information regarding the Princes Trust Team programme please contact Paul Hamblin on 07717227503

For any other enquiries please call the local Princes Trust Office on 01604 633226

The year 8 kic.in2.study group have just completed a ten week programme based at the Cobblers Study Centre.  Attendance was excellent and we saw a great improvement in confidence in a number of the young people.  Early sessions were dedicated to getting to know each other and learning to work as a team.  Margaret’s drain pipe game was great fun, and we almost cracked group juggling. 

 We were lucky to have the opportunity to tour the stadium, visiting many areas the general public don’t usually get the chance to see.  Lots of photographs were taken and the students then used Publisher to create a comic strip incorporating photographs and text.  The stadium was the location for the orienteering activity which brought out the competitive spirit in several people. 

A presentation by the healthy food and drink team saw us sampling a range of fruit, some familiar, some fairly strange, and then we made and taste-tested several smoothie recipes.  Mmmmmm  

We followed up this activity by devising a healthy menu for the Cobblers team on a match day.

A memory workshop challenged us all to improve our memory skills through a series of activities ranging from the familiar “I went to market….”, Kim’s game, practising grouping  things together, card memory games and more complicated visualisation tricks.  Everyone saw some improvement in their ability to remember things.  On another occasion we looked at different types of intelligence and tried to work out where our strengths lay - were we number smart, people smart, body smart, word smart, myself smart, picture smart, nature smart or music smart?

One week saw us visiting Franklin Gardens to join a PfS group from the Saints Study Centre in a Circus Skills workshop led by the county jester Kevin Burke.  Research has shown that these activities give the brain a bit of a workout and aid concentration.  We also saw how it encouraged the students to persevere at an activity and keep practising until they’d mastered it.  We saw some great juggling, fantastic work with the flower sticks, superb plate spinnng and impressive stilt walking.

Bellboating was a new venture for the Kic.in2.study programme and we are very grateful to Margaret for organising our session at the Northampton Sailing Club at Pitsford reservoir.  She assured us the boat was virtually unsinkable, provided everyone with buoyancy aids, a quick lesson in the rudiments, and before we knew it the Kic.in2.study boat crew were on the water! 

This has been a fantastic group to work with and we will miss them on Wednesday evenings.  However we hope to see them on some of the holiday activities on offer, and again next year.

I have had a great time at the Cobblers playing games like the Gutter Game and the Football Card game!! Making bags, slide shows and a menu for a restaurant I have had fun doing all of them. This is something that I will never be able to do again!! It is a big thank you to the people that do this, the volunteers and Jean and Margaret!! They have made it fun!!! Rhiannon - Falconers Hill.