Even Matt Hayes had to start sometime, somewhere. He had family to hand. One of the biggest reasons why people don’t start fishing is simply because they have no one to take them or show them the basics. That is why Matt supports Dreamstore UK in finding ways for people to help people to go fishing.
Glamorgan Anglers Club has an active community programme, always seeking to broaden the offer at its waters for people of all ages and ability. The Club is very much focused on angling participation for all and has been particularly active finding ways to increase angling access for the disabled angler.
The Club requested a small grant from Dreamstore, to cover the cost of five very large umbrellas. The Browning umbrella is 2.5 metres wide when open, which allows a wheelchair user and helper stay dry from the rain or shaded from a hot sun. Dreamstore is delighted to see that good use is being made of the umbrellas and that this small grant goes a long way to improving the angling experience for the disabiled angler.
Iain Mackie is the community leader at INTACT (subject of an earlier post), and here along with volunteer Keith Laycock they each outline the benefit of building angling into the programme of community activities around Ignol, Preston.
Southlands Angling Club is a project within Southlands School, near Lymington, Hampshire. Southlands School is a residential special school for around 50 boys aged 9- 16 years old with a diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome and associated conditions.
Most of the pupils are of average or above average ability; however significant difficulties in a range of key areas of development affect their everyday life. These difficulties may embrace social understanding and communication, flexibility of thinking, motor skills, coordination and sequencing skills, attention and concentration, and anxiety when faced with new situations or change. Challenging or manipulative behaviour is a common response to anxiety making it difficult to access mainstream community facilities without support. These skills have to be taught gradually over time. Many pupils have very low self confidence and self- esteem and find the classroom learning environment extremely challenging.
Within the grounds of the school there was a small disused lake. Some pupils expressed interest in fishing this lake. It became clear that fishing, even using a stick with line, was a positive experience and more importantly our lake had fish. The interest in fishing snowballed, with the school council suggesting restoration of the lake so that pupils can use it as part of “Southlands Fishing Club” during evenings and at weekends.
Two taster days were arranged with “Fun 2 Fish” where 12 pupils were given the opportunity to try fishing with professional coaching. These days were a fantastic learning experience. Pupils who normally have difficulty managing their anxiety, controlling their behaviour and remaining on task in the classroom, spent 5 hours at the lake; fully engaged, relaxed and thoroughly enjoying themselves.
Elsewhere we have provided an update on the progress of Halton Brook Children’s Centre, Runcorn
We recently met with Mo Ball, the Community Development Worker at Halton Brook who explained the value of the early provision of a small grant to get an angling group organised at the Children’s Centre:
“During my work with parents in the community I started to talk about fishing and how enjoyable and relaxing it was. Some of the parents told me their children wanted to go fishing, but had no-one to help or go with them. I thought this would be a good reason to start the fishing club. Early starter sessions were a huge success. By bringing along the parents on days out we had a great team of helpers on hand and a great means of bringing families and young people together.”
“Buying the equipment would have been a big challenge as this would have been very expensive and not within our resources, so we are very pleased Dreamstore was so generous.”