Sport
Sport has an important place in the curriculum at St Martins School as we believe it contributes significantly to the physical, social and personal development of students.
The school has a variety of facilities including basketball and netball courts, a well marked football field, an indoor hall, and well grassed playing fields.
Students are encouraged to enter into our four main school sporting events:
- The first event of the year is always the School Swimming sports, which is strongly contested at Halswell Pool. The top three students in each event qualifies for entry into the South Zone Swimming Sports. Once students reach this level competition increases for a place in the South Zone team to compete at the Canterbury Primary Schools event.
- The second major event of the year is the School Duathlon, which is held at Hansen Park. Students progress directly to the Canterbury Primary School Sports as there is no zone event.
- Leading into the colder months we have the School Cross Country. This event is a tradition at St Martins School. Each class competes with others in their Syndicate to win the Darra Pin Trophy. The Pin is from a ship that arrived in Lyttleton Harbour many years ago, and it was mounted onto a trophy for St Martins School. Over the years each syndicate has developed their own version of the trophy with the Year 4 having the Rolling Pin and the Year 3 a Split Pin. The trophy is awarded to the class in each syndicate that has the lowest total from the six best placings in that class.
- The final event of the year sees our students compete in the School Athletics Day. The Events are Long Jump, High Jump, Shot Putt, Discus, Sprints and the 1500 metre. Students who place well are able to pick three specialist areas to compete in at the South Zone Athletic Sports in hope of qualifying through to the Canterbury Event which is currently held in Ashburton.
Team Sports – Thursday afternoon – Year 5/6 and 7/8
St Martins School also participates in the inter schools winter weekly sport competition that is run by Primary Sport Canterbury. Students can play either netball, rugby, hockey, football or basketball. The Year 7/8s and Year 5/6s play Thursday afternoons during winter. Below is the link for the Primary Sport Canterbury website, which has all the information (draws and maps) – http://www.primarysportscanterbury.org.nz/
For the link to the weekly draws only – http://drawsresults.sportsrunner.net/?org=PSC
Other Sports:
In the summer season (Term 4) students have the opportunity to play Touch Football for the school at the local Waltham Park schools competition. For more information here is the link: www.sporty.co.nz/smarttouch
The Year 7/8 also have the opportunity to participate in Koru Games, which was set up to provide South Island Year 7/8 students with an accessible opportunity to develop their individual skill sets through playing team sport for their school. It’s based in the Selwyn District. Students can participate in Badminton, Coccia, Lawn Bowls, Netball, Rugby Sevens, Basketball, Ki O Rahi, Squash, Volleyball, Football, Tennis, Hockey, Table Tennis, Touch and Ultimate. The Koru Games website is http://www.korugames.nz/
We are also fortunate to receive specialist Sport Canterbury Programmes. This involves specialist sports coaches coming to our school and running coaching clinics for blocks of 4-6 weeks. These range from Touch Canterbury, Tennis in Schools programme, Golf in schools, Lawn bowls, softball, and many others.
Checkout some photos of our sporting events here.
Awards:
Students are awarded certificates for placing in the top three school events. Age champion for each school event is awarded on a points-based system.
The end of year sees our Full School Awards. These are presented to students in Year 7/8 and is the schools way of recognising excellence in that particular area. The awards are:
- Year 7/8 Soccer Player of the Year
- Year 7/8 Soccer – Most improved player
- Senior Swimming Champion
- Female Cross Country Champion
- Male Cross Country Champion
- Male Athletics Champion
- Female Athletics Champion
- Best All Round Year 5/6 Sports Person
- Best and Fairest Sports Award
- The Bill Burgess Memorial Award (Best all round sports person)