Pre-Prep Sport

Sport is an essential part of life at Eaton House Belgravia. We believe that team and individual sports are essential for a child’s mental development and wellbeing. We also encourage the boys to stay active with three separate sport sessions per week. Our aim is not only to develop the boys skills, but we also teach the boys to be coachable, good sportsmen and to always play in the spirit of the game.

The Pre-Prep boys are exposed to a wide variety of curricular and extracurricular sports. A combination of onsite PE lessons and offsite games and swimming sessions enables the boys to develop key sporting skills. Eaton House Schools is considered a very ‘sporty’ group of schools, perhaps due to the number of specialist and outside coaches we employ to improve the boys’ skills and their sporting range.

The games we practise include cricket, tag and contact rugby, cross-country, football, swimming, hockey, basketball, tennis and a range of athletics, including track, long jump and high jump. There are clubs for a number of sports, including clubs on site or at Battersea Park.

Colours are awarded for the highest levels of sporting achievement. Regardless of whether boys are awarded colours, we ask that they play with passion, commitment and team spirit. There are also plenty of sporting inter-house competitions including prizes for football, cross-country, tag-rugby, cricket and at sports day.

Sport helps the pupils’ physical and emotional health as well as teaching them to be a part of a team representing the school and their house. Every boy joins in and that is very important for building confidence, team spirit, sociability and overall house spirit.

Eaton House Belgravia Pre-Prep has access to swimming facilities, astro-turf multi use courts, tennis courts and Battersea Park and Clapham Common for games.

In school, sport is centred on learning skills through game play and the boys are able to play competitively in a number of house-specific competitions and externally against local schools. Boys love to win points for their house while learning to win and lose as part of a team. It is great to see all boys participating and having the feeling of belonging and self worth.

Click on the dropdown options below to find out more about our sports.

Rugby

The Pre-Prep boys play tag rugby and it helps to develop running pace, coordination, spatial awareness and ball skills. They enjoy the sense of freedom that the game brings and it is a good preparation for rugby in the Prep school and at senior school.

It is a minimal contact team game in which each player wears a belt with Velcro patches with two tags attached to them. The method of play is similar to rugby league, touch rugby or rugby sevens, with attacking players attempting to dodge, evade and pass a rugby ball while defenders attempt to prevent them scoring by ‘tagging’ – pulling a Velcro-attached tag from the ball carrier. The attacking team attempts to score a try or take the ball down field as close to the line as possible. Tries are worth one point and there are no conversions. The team scoring the most points will win the game.

We focus on tag-rugby in the spring term during games lessons and as the term progresses we aim to develop the boys’ confidence in understanding the game, their ability to beat a defender, to pass to a member of their team, to defend resolutely and to score tries and make positive decisions. We do this through a range of team based games rather than static isolated skill exercises.

The boys in the Pre-Prep participate in fixtures and tournaments against local schools from Year 2 and there are inter-house matches from Kindergarten to Year 3.

Football

Football is very popular at Eaton House Belgravia and the boys enjoy the different aspects of learning the game and improving their technique and ability. All of our sessions are taught through game-based activities allowing the boys to be active all of the time, encourage competition and develop their skills in a range of ways. Football sessions also teaches the boys the importance of team spirit, selflessness, determination and control.

At Eaton House, we play football in the Autumn Term. The aim for the Pre-Prep boys is for them to gain a greater understanding of the game, improve their basic skills and to have fun. We play inter class and inter house competitions from Kindergarten through to year three and we play inter school fixtures in years two and three.

We have a range of multi-sport extra-curricular clubs where there are aspects of football included along with an external after-school football club for those boys who enjoy the sport and would like to take their game to a higher level.

Cricket

The summer term brings the start of our summer cricket season and cricket is a very popular sport in the school. Improved running skills, batting skills, hand-eye co-ordination, catching skills and individual and team success – these are just some of the benefits that this very enjoyable game brings.

At Eaton House Belgravia, the Pre-Prep boys have been working on their gross motor skills in preparation for moving on to the more technical aspects of cricket. It has been great to see the boys improving, their fielding skills with quicker pick-ups, more accurate and powerful throwing and greater confidence when catching.

The boys have also been working on their batting and bowling technique through fun, game based activities. This is all in preparation for the hotly contested inter house cricket competition and for year two and year three to take part in fixtures against local schools

As with all Games and PE lessons at Eaton House Belgravia we not only want to improve the boys’ skills and techniques, we also want to foster a love of participation and a love of the game. The sessions are fun and engaging and the boys leave the session with a smile on their face.

Athletics

Athletics is very important at Eaton House Belgravia Pre-Prep and we enjoy many varieties of the sport.

At our sports day we were delighted to participate in a variety of sports which included traditional running races and relays. House challenges are always exciting for the boys as they love to try to run like the wind to win extra house points!

We all enjoy running cross country and we are lucky to have nearby Battersea Park and Clapham Common for green and unhindered runs. The fitness and conditioning that athletics and cross-country build up are essential to our successful pursuit of many other sports.

 

Other Sports

Eaton House Belgravia boys participate in other sports such as tennis, swimming, basketball and hockey which require the boys to have athletic capability. They benefit from the athletics and cross-country practice that the boys regularly complete. Our aim is to build up the boys’ overall fitness and athletics stamina so that they enjoy many sports.

We are firm believes at Eaton House that there is a sport for everyone and it is our task to provide a range of opportunities during Games and PE lessons for the boys to find their passion and form a love and relationship with a particular sport as they move through the schools and on onto their secondary destinations.

Inter-School Competitions

Eaton House Belgravia is a school where sport is taken seriously – even at the Pre-Prep.

We enjoy presenting a challenge to neighbouring schools in competitions and tournaments. We give of our best on the field and we are always proud to take home the winner’s shield.

Inter-school competitions between Eaton House Belgravia and Eaton House The Manor take many forms, from sporting to musical. One of the best examples of an inter-school challenge is the David Lawrence Series Annual Challenge Cup.

The David Lawrence Cup

This cup encompasses nine events between Eaton House Belgravia and Eaton House The Manor, including football, cricket, golf, cross-country, hockey, tennis, swimming, chess and dodgeball. The boys love the challenge of taking part. Here are a couple of their experiences, showing their grit and enthusiasm:

We knew the cross country run around Clapham Common was going to be tough as the Manor were defending the cup for the 4th year running. The 12 boys who ran against the Manor 2s’ boys ran 1.3km and scored 176 points beating the Manor 2s by 30 points. There was an amazing near win in this race, which was really exciting.

The 3s ran 2km but came up against an incredibly strong Manor team. The score was 202 v 146 to Eaton House The Manor, and so, on aggregate, the Manor won 365 v 329. It was a hard pill for us 3s to swallow given the amount of practice and effort which we’d been putting in at games, hockey and, in some cases, with the squat jumps we’d been urged to do at home.

I was quite pleased with my own performance in coming fourth, but with only three of us in the top 10 in Year 3, it was never going to be our day. It was very enjoyable though.

—Cross-Country Captain

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