After-school training and games often, you know - there’s teams and panels selected for those and they’re restricted.". sports participation, namely physical, social and mental health - rates and patterns of participation fluctuate throughout the life course (2). If you have access to schools, this leader can often be the more “edgy” girl (or boy). If you force a student into a sport they don’t like, it will not yield good a outcome. As expected, female athletes have also benefited from the evolution of the medical and nutritional sciences and are continuously achieving higher distinctions. You may also need to ensure that men can’t spectate. (Very interestingly though, the same data shows that 74% of girls want to be more active). Meáin Náisiúnta Seirbhíse Poiblí na hÉireann. "People who don't take part in sport, particularly older adolescents and adults, it’s generally because they have low self-efficacy, they don’t think they have the perceived competence. "So another key thing in adolescents and teenagers is just promoting and trying to increase their own self-efficacy and their own belief that they are competent and it’s all kind of part of helping them overcome those barriers. What's the psychology behind our obsession with reality TV? Why do I have to leave my personal belongings there when I don’t yet trust you. (d) Women should be aware regarding the benefits of sports. Off the back of three hair-raising Camogie finals last weekend, it's been an exciting summer for women's sport. Why do we find it so hard to stop using plastic bottles? "Because even if you look across under 6 and under 8 sport in Ireland, from the get go, they’re in tournaments and it’s all competitions," she says. The course was packed with evidence-based tips, other information and rich discussions, and was well worth attending. VicHealth’s Changing the Game: Increasing Female Participation in Sport program was launched on 10 August 2015 at the National Tennis Centre, Melbourne. "So they’ll have a Gaelic team, a hurling team, a soccer team. Carlin says fun gets overlooked in a sporting context, but the research has consistently shown that the main drivers for keeping boys and girls at any age engaged in sport are fun and being around their peers. Advertising for new students to join your own club is the obvious approach, and that’s absolutely fine. more female athletes than male athletes •Too many girls coming out for some sports with too little experience - tennis •Increasing demand for additional sports – field hockey •80+ female high schoolers volunteering as coaches •Confident with participation numbers … In short, sports just aren’t “fun” any more. It means that you don’t have to give up when you’re 18, you can keep going. In ancient times, for one of the most popular sports – the Olympics, the female gender was not allowed to … You can run a number of ideas past them (images, wording, presentation) and take feedback on “what works” for them. So often, a convenient, local venue which women are already used to can be perfect, such as the local college, or a children’s centre. Earlier this year, the BBC launched its #changethegame campaign and RTÉ has partnered with the 20x20 'If she can’t see it, she can’t be it’ campaign. Understand and address barriers faced by young mums, 5. The place to be for everything grassroots sport! You’re more likely to succeed with this group if the whole class comprises young women in similar circumstances. Pitch Hero Ltd registered in England | WF3 1DR | Company number - 06361033. On a related note, it can often be helpful to use a faith venue if you are looking to recruit women and girls from minority ethnic communities, to make it feel more familiar and comfortable for attendees. The increasing rates of female athletes’ participation in sports events help counter gender biases. All you need to know - Camogie All-Ireland finals, Why periods matter when it comes to females in sport, The challenge of encouraging more teenage girls to be physically active. Understand the needs of women in challenging circumstances, 8. Advocate for equal representation. When an exercise class puts the emphasis on improving appearance (such as a focus on burning calories), this can actually make women feel more self-conscious and insecure about their bodies. 10 Tips for Engaging Women and Girls in Sport, 1. She wears the number 5 jersey proudly and has stuck with her sport right through school, even as other girls dropped off. If a girl’s or women’s competition doesn’t exist start asking for it. It can be done though publishing great stories about women, through raising awareness on social media, through hiring more women, through making an unapologetically feminist sports podcast, through supporting new websites that give platforms to women’s sports and female journalists, through publicly calling out news organizations on their lack of diversity, through producing academic studies that highlight gender inequality, and through prominently featuring women’s sports … From RTÉ Archives, a camogie match in Mayo in 1956. What I really loved about this course, and the pack of written resources that all participants received, was the colour, vibrancy and huge range of potential it all seemed to open up. Participation in sport is an excellent ... getting family “buy in” for female participation when developing programmes. To us, all the little customs and routines of our own sport and/or club are perfectly reasonable and normal. "As they move into secondary school, they would rather maybe go up to the town and socialise with their friends for an hour than go and do activity… so that’s maybe replacing time in the evenings that would have previously been spent being active," she says. Step 2 Us Girls therefore recommends word of mouth, direct contact, social media, taster sessions and outreach work. On a related note, you should try to discourage women from exercising for appearance-related reasons. Support girls and young women to develop a positive body image, 9. Secondly because you may be able to link in with whatever the local community is doing to celebrate a key event, to promote your club. It’s also helpful if you have a good understanding of the issues and barriers these women are facing – this may mean that you and/or colleagues need extra training or other learning opportunities. Images that show what’s involved in the activity can also be very attractive to encourage young women to have a go. However, it can also be intimidating to some women if they see themselves as “not the sporty type”. Along with visibility and role models, Carlin says an issue that comes up frequently around girls and sport is around "perceived femininity" - sport is unfeminine - and not wanting to be sweaty or not wanting to mess up their hair. The advice here was all about making it easy and uncomplicated for them to join in your sport. But a young woman walking in for the first time may have all kinds of questions: So try to put your own confidence and experience to one side, and really think about all the things you do and say, which might seem strange to new people. Personal qualities are always important in a coach, but perhaps even more so for this group. Us Girls also promotes a range of innovative good practice such as linking in non-sporting activities to your sessions, to make them more attractive to this group. You can help with this by setting small, achievable goals, which may include attendance goals. The workshop tutor explained that it can be hard (and time-consuming) to engage this group and win their trust. And as the trainer pointed out, all of us attending the workshop were there because we love and “get” sport. Girls and younger women are also highly influenced by the opinion of their peers. "In some qualitative work that we’ve done, we sort of expected role models and things like that to come out as a driver, but many say no, it was more friends.". So if you’re unsure how to engage girls and young women in your sport, don’t hold back. Younger women especially are more attracted by bold, bright colours; and by photos than other images. He also advised that it’s helpful to be aware of faith calendars. Female participation in sport & physical activity A snapshot of the evidence Females of all ages generally have lower physical activity participation rates than males.1 Increasing physical activity levels for females is important for health and mental wellbeing.1 Understanding and addressing the barriers preventing more female A Women in Sport report concludes girls are not engaging enough with school sports. © RTÉ 2021. One of the best ways to increase women’s body confidence is to increase their feelings of self-efficacy. Times have changed, and the IOC has played an important role in establishing a positive trend to enhance women’s participation in sport. There are more girlsplaying high school sport today than years past. ", The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ. This could be a bad experience in a PE class, a teacher, or not getting picked for a team. At a young age, the barriers to sport and physical activity are much more structural and physical, Carlin explains. He talked about getting into partnership working with agencies who already support them. Why they need to stay in: More than three-quarters of working women feel that sports participation … This makes Caoimhe’s story a little different. Influence in participation of sports. We need your consent to load this rte-player content. Check out her blog and download her free e-book on how to attract and retain more female students in your dojo. Therefore, barriers to their participation in sport and active recreation may be … Analysis: there's still a lot of work to be done to ensure that women stay engaged with sport on an equal footing with men. This group was highlighted on the course because young mums tend to be very busy and time-poor, so exercise is often pretty low down on their list of priorities. tournaments to support participation initiatives and use LET players to inspire women and girls to take up the sport. You could even train up someone in that agency to deliver your sport, or to help out in your own sessions. Making sport the ‘norm’ for women relies on local women of all ages, sizes and faiths not only becoming active, but celebrating it … It’s a smart, powerful action we can take as individuals and as a community to improve girls’ physical, mental, and emotional health. Some women will also appreciate being able to wear clothing of their choice such as long trousers, long sleeves and head coverings. However, it appears that women are still faced with gender equity issues in sports governance, athletic media representation, and perception in sports. Women in Sport strongly believe that we need to promote participation amongst girls at an early age to ensure they have a positive relationship with sport and to effectively tackle this entrenched gender gap. Caoimhe intends to keep up the sport even when she goes to college and seeing older teammates do this has helped her see it’s possible. The most important thing about a coach for girls and young women is their ability to coach well, lead and inspire. That’s a very high number of young women and girls who simply aren’t used to exercise, and may well feel nervous or alienated at the prospect. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.