Resources

The Primary Tai Chi programme has been developed by professional Tai Chi instructors who have experience of teaching in Primary Schools, and is intended to help class teachers design and run their own daily exercise classes without any need to hire external instructors or undergo extensive specialist training themselves.

We aim to give them all they need to do this successfully, and have categorised the various exercises in terms of their main effects, both emotional and physical, so that they can be combined in different ways to achieve different results, depending on the needs of a particular group at a particular time. That might be to calm the children and focus them for their class work, or to energise and improve physical fitness – notably balance and co-ordination - as part of a Healthy School initiative.

This “self-sufficiency” approach is particularly valuable as it gives a teacher the flexibility they would not otherwise have to break up the day and introduce some physical activity at strategic times in response to the group and its moods as they change in the course of the day.

The resource packs currently available can be linked in to other areas of the curriculum, such as culture, religion, arts & crafts, and history so that it becomes a part of the fabric of the total school experience.  They provide everything a class teacher needs to run – and sustain – their own successful, independent Healthy School programme.

In addition, to help groups of like-minded Head Teachers and other budget holders develop their own local Primary Tai Chi initiative we also offer a half-day workshop run by our instructors.  This is delivered at the Client's preferred venue, and can be a very quick, cost effective way to get a programme up and running when the expense is shared by several schools.

It's also a particularly useful way to set up a local self-help network.  This in itself is a valuable tool for building both the confidence and the enthusiasm needed to sustain any such venture.

The Primary Tai Chi Range of Products & Services
For Individual Teachers
	to help teachers learn and teach the exercises properly, understand their origins, and structure and promote their own Primary Tai Chi programme.
	to support teachers during the critical first month of their programme.
For School Groups / LEAs / Healthy School Coordinators
	to provide centralised, co-ordinated training for a group of schools in one particular locality.
Exclusive to the Primary Tai Chi Community
	to supply programme leaders with additional, programme-related merchandise to sustain and promote their work to their respective interest groups (only available to community members).

In designing the Primary Tai Chi programme, we’ve taken several points into consideration:

1. The capabilities and attention span of young children.

For young children (in our terms, those who are 8 or younger) Tai Chi is usually too complex, time consuming, and mystifying.

To overcome this, we have selected self-contained exercises which address different aspects of personal development; physical, emotional, and mental.  These exercises are often linked to animals, or other vivid images, so they are memorable and can be presented in a variety of fun ways according to each individual teacher’s personal style of teaching.

2. Teachers are pressed for time.

We fully appreciate how pressed for time teachers are, and that, as a result, they have to be able to learn the exercises quickly and easily.  Again, we have taken elements from both Tai Chi and Chi Kung which are short and simple. 

In addition to various instructional teaching aids, we offer a personal Help Line contact who can offer further guidance and support, if needed, during the first month after purchase.

3. Budgets are tight.

At under £100, the Primary Tai Chi programme is both affordable and flexible; enabling schools to become largely self-sufficient as far as running their own exercise-based initiative is concerned.  Moreover, we provide additional information which can provide inspiration for links to other elements of the curriculum.

 

4. Your colleagues may not all share your enthusiasm to begin with.

It’s a brave move in any organisation to try something new, but the more colleagues and children are aware of your activities, the more they generally want to find out what you’re really up to!

Our materials can help you to raise the profile of your programme amongst colleagues, children, parents, and the community at large.

 

5. The greater the longevity of a programme, the greater the benefits derived.

The greatest benefits come from making your programme an integral part of school life.  To realise and sustain improvements in behaviour and general well-being, programmes need to be kept alive so that they are seen not just as part of the daily routine, or one person’s passing fancy, but rather an indispensable part of each day’s activity.

This, of course, puts pressure on session leaders to keep those sessions fresh.

We build flexibility into the Primary Tai Chi programme.  This helps not only to hold the children’s interest, but also enables teachers to re-design a programme in order to emphasise different benefits and so reflect the changing needs of a particular group at any given time.