Sports and Recreation – Antonia Martin

Sport and Recreation Officer – Antonia Martin

Traveller Women’s Swim Programme

A new 10 week swimming programme for traveller women is currently running in the Ballymun Leisure Centre.  This is a joint initiative between St. Margaret’s Traveller Centre and Dublin City Council.  This is a very successful programme as it provides participants with this extremely important life long skill.

Men’s Health Fair

Dublin City Council was well represented at a recent Men’s Health Fair that took place in St. Margaret’s Traveller Site in Ballymun.  Information on Dublin City Council’s local leisure facilities and sport and recreation staff were promoted.  Pedometers were also provided which act as a motivational tool to assist people increase the number of steps they take per day.

Tai Chi

Due to local demand, Tai Chi recommenced in Ballymun Leisure Centre on the 14^th October.  Participants can join the class at any time with both beginners and advanced being catered for.  This class continues to be popular and is very reasonable priced at just €3 for the hour and a half session.

Ballymun Sports Week

A number of additional activities were organised as part of Ballymun Sports Week which ran from the 25^th-29^th October.  These included Safety for Seniors, basketball and games for young people with disabilities and multi-games for Older Adults.

Puck Around Town

A 6 week Puck Around Town programme is currently running in Poppintree Sports Centre.  This programme is run in partnership with Setanta Hurling and Camogie Club and aims to introduce young girls, aged 7-10, to the sport of Camogie.  It was decided to run the programme in the Poppintree Centre to encourage girls from this area to attend.  The overall aim is that these girls will join Setanta after the 6 week programme.  Advertising took place in all local primary schools.  Cost for the programme is just €5 for the 6 weeks.

Odinswood Keep Fit Programme

A 6 week keep fit programme for older adults commenced in Odinswood Day Care Centre on Thursday 4^th October.  The programme caters for frail older adults and the exercises aim to gently build participants cardiovascular fitness, strength, balance and co-ordination.  The programme also incorporates a social aspect to encourage interaction between participants.

Meet and Train

Meet and Train continues to run every Wednesday evening at 7pm in Johnstown Park, Finglas.  Participants continue to enter regular organised races to maintain motivation.  Training plans will be distributed in the New Year for those planning on running the Dublin City Marathon.

Aqua Fit

The three Aqua Fit programmes for Older Adults continue to run in the Ballymun and Finglas Leisure Centres.  These programmes continue to attract high numbers of Older Adults every week.

Fall Prevention Exercise Programme

The falls prevention programme is a specialised exercise programme aimed at increasing balance, strength and co-ordination in older adults at risk of falling.  Research has shown that participation in specialised programmes reduces the risk of falls in this vulnerable population.  The programme commenced in Ballymun Leisure Centre on the 24^th September  and is a new and innovative initiative.  It is the first programme of its kind to be piloted in a Dublin City Council Leisure Centre.  Participants are referred to the programme by the HSE physiotherapy team.  A bus service, Vantastic, is funded by Ballymun/Whitehall Partnership to transport the participants to and from the programme.  An expert in fitness for older adults is delivering the programme with the assistance of two staff members from Ballymun Leisure Centre.  These staff members will also undertake additional theoretical training to give them the knowledge and skills to deliver the programme alone.  This initiative recently was awarded second place in the HSE National Achievement Awards out of 320 entries.  It is hoped to repeat the success of this programme in other Dublin City Council facilities.

Tennis

Dublin City Council in partnership with Parks Tennis offered Adult Tennis Lessons at the Tennis Courts in Trinity Comprehensive School every Saturday from 4-5pm from the 9^th October to 13^th November at a cost of €3 per hour.

Code of Ethics and Good Practice in Children’s Sport

This course is aimed at people working with young people in sports clubs and aims to raise awareness of good practice when working with children in sport and also to provide participants with an increased understanding of the different types of abuse.  This training programme was delivered by the Sport and Recreation Officer to students in Colaiste Ide.

Children’s Officer Training

The first Children’s Officer training course organised by Dublin City Council will be delivered on Saturday 29^th January 2011 in the Finglas Civic Offices.  This course is a follow on from the Basic Awareness course and provides participants with the additional knowledge and confidence required to act as Children’s Officer in their club.

Bike Start

Dublin City Council has developed a new Bike Start Cycling Training Programme for primary schools and trainee adults returning to biking.  The programme mainly takes place in schools throughout the year targeting 4^th-6^th class pupils (10-12 year olds).  The Sport and Recreation Officer will be trained to tutor this programme and will begin the roll out in 2011.

Peer Mentoring

A training programme is currently being devised to train older adult participants of a cardiac rehabilitation programme to become peer mentors to new participants.  The project is a joint initiative between Dublin City Council and Dublin City University.  The training will take place in January and the intervention will be piloted soon after.

Ageing with Confidence

The Sport and Recreation Officer in partnership with the Tolka Area Partnership Older Person’s  Co-ordinator are currently delivering the Ageing with Confidence programme to a group of Older Adults in the Father Maloney hall in Ballygall.

Positive Ageing Week

As part of Positive Ageing Week 2010, the Sport and Recreation Officer in partnership with the Dublin City Council Community and RAPID sections and Tolka Area Partnership, held a Health Fair for Older Adults.  This took place in the Finglas Youth Resource Centre on Friday the 1^st October.  A number of services for older adults were present on the day to explain their service and offer information.  Participants were also given the opportunity to participate in seated exercise to music, tai chi, massage and reflexology.

Contact: Antonia Martin – 087 1254709