The Sheriff’s Challenge is a series of activities for primary school-age children encouraging them to walk, run, swim and cycle.

Here at Rise Park we compete in the running challenge. The ‘Running’ Challenge (AKA Active Mile / The Daily Mile) is FREE for Nottingham City schools to take part.  Benefits include promoting better health and wellbeing, children being outdoors and active, improved concentration, attainment, behaviour and attendance.

The Sheriff’s Challenge is a really simple way to measure the fitness of children throughout the course of a school year as well as promoting our four PE drivers that link in well with the Sheriff’s Challenge concept, respecting the rules of the task, demonstrating resilience when situations may get a little tricky, collaborating with others (how can we support each other) and being aware of our own and others emotions whilst participating in activity

Pupils get the opportunity to run around our track that is marked on the school playground, the track measures 50 meters for KS1 and 100 metres for KS2. Pupils are encouraged to run the Sheriff’s Challenge with their class teacher a minimum of three times per week in slots that work for that class, it can be ran in school uniform, making the children energised through movement and has transferred positively into the classroom. Pupil laps are recorded over the course of the week and our children are able to see how many laps they have ran easily with the aid of our Sheriff’s Challenge whiteboards that are updated by our Sheriff’s Challenge monitors.

Throughout the week pupils are able to compete against others and themselves to achieve personal bests.

Most importantly at Rise Park we want children to understand the need to be active and at the same time enjoy being active.

The City Mayor has challenged all City schools to cumulatively Walk, Jog or Run around the world which equates to a staggering 25,000 Miles. The great thing about the Sheriffs Challenge is that other City schools will be taking part and this gives an opportunity to compete virtually against other schools. Who will top the leader board?

The main objective of the Sheriff’s challenge at Rise Park Primary and Nursery is to see progression in our children’s fitness levelsALL children are encouraged and frequently reminded that this is not a race and that pacing yourself is a recipe for success.

The Sheriff’s Challenge embodies our four PE key drivers:

  • Resilience – When fatigue sets and running becomes uncomfortable, do we give up and can we remain at a slow, constant jog to keep the performance continuing for yourself and the class, because remember if half of the group stops, we all stop.
  • Respect for the rules – Keeping to the course and not cutting the corners to ensuring running the full distance of each lap.
  • Collaborating with others – Shared team sense of responsibility – can we encourage others in class to keep moving and keep the time allowed to run laps for going.
  • Emotional Awareness – Can we demonstrate empathy, how are other people feeling, how can we spot these triggers and how do we have to behave to get the most out of different personalities in the team.

The four main factors that can affect class scores:

  • Number of childrenn in class
  • Number of weeks in half term,
  • Weather
  • Participation (amount of times each class gets out to run weekly)