Yesterday’s session with the Community Healthcare Workers (CHWs), highlighted to the team the disparity of knowledge of FGM with people who are at the front-line of facing this problem within their community. Whilst all were aware of the practice, some did not know the different types of FGM or what affects it could have on women’s health. In the knowledge of this we invited them to today’s coach education session where, along with the teachers of the schools we had coached at over the week and young leaders within the Laikipia community, they would learn more about FGM but do so in a fun way with cricket coaching skills that they could share with the young boys and girls in their community.
Throughout the week, as we have been coaching, we have all come up with how we can use the B.A.T messages in our coaching and it’s a learning process for us all. Today would be the test of our new skills, as we had to show how it worked, to others within the Laikipia community to ensure the spread of the messages. CWB Ambassador Nicholas led one of the first coaching stations demonstrating a close catching drill, whilst ensuring that B – Break the silence and call your partners name as you throw them the ball, A – Advocate watching the ball at all times, and T – Your little fingers stick together when you catch the ball (just in case you were wondering how we made it work) were incorporated in the coaching. It was encouraging to see that the teachers, CHWs and young leaders were able to coach this drill, along with many others drills, by the end of the day. For those that were being coached, especially the CHWs, Ann-Marie and Esther’s training provided all with a working knowledge about FGM, as well as avenues of support within the community that they could share with others.
To round off the coach education session we taught everyone the classic game of ‘Rapid-Fire Cricket’. If you are coaching on green outfield in England or a dusty pitch in the middle of the Maasai it’s a guaranteed hit to get kids interested in cricket (even if you are only coaching the skills and not the proper game). A quick introduction for all to ‘African Box Scoring Method’, see picture above (thanks Cricket Cameroon for adding another method of cricket scoring to the knowledge -Ed) and the day of cricket and FGM education both on and off the field of play was complete.