On Thursday 8th October, Team Mintridge travelled down to visit Quilters Junior School with Paralympian Dan Powell and his dog Elmo, to join in with their school Paralympic week.

The day started with an inspirational presentation to the children, where Dan talked about resilience and determination, which he has experienced throughout his Paralympic sporting journey. Dan expressed the importance of perseverance and always picking yourself up after setbacks. Dan used the example of not getting picked for the GB squad and he thought about giving up Judo as a result. Instead of giving up, Dan persevered and trained even harder to make it into the squad next time. Dan also referenced lots of other areas where he would not have been able to compete on the world stage, travel the world and win numerous medals, if he had just given up and walked away from his sport. This taught the children to always try before saying no and giving up.

At Quilters Junior School, Mr Wade who is an incredible head teacher, promotes positive mental well-being through five ways. These are, being active, to keep learning, to take notice, give to others and to connect to people. Dan covered each of these in his presentation which was amazing for the children to learn from and showed the children that through ups and downs you can still focus on maintaining the five ways of positive well-being.

As the day progressed, Dan was then invited to two Q&A sessions in the classrooms. The children were so excited to ask Dan questions after his presentation, with the majority of their hands in the air waiting to ask their top burning questions. Dan was asked a lot of questions about Elmo, his guide dog (who was the hidden star of the show!), and about supporting Liverpool, but as well as that, the children asked some really good questions about Dan’s sporting journey. As there were so many questions, some children wrote down their questions and placed them in the Mintridge post box, which we got to read at the end of the day. Some of the best questions were;

“How long have you been taking part in judo?”

“Where was your favourite Olympic trip?”

“How many medals have you won?”

“Does Elmo travel to competitions with you?”

“What’s your favourite sport apart from Judo?”

“Why did you start playing Judo?”

“What is the one sport you wish you could play?”

Dan was also asked, “What advice would you give to your younger self?” ,which he replied, “to stick with it no matter how tough it gets; it will get better!”

Throughout this Q&A session, Dan promoted a positive outlook on life with his motto being “…a lot of people have it worse than me”, and the fact that “…disability doesn’t mean inability”. This taught the children that life is challenging and some people have it harder than others, but if you remain resilient, with a positive mindset and follow the five ways to maintain a positive mental wellbeing, you can face any challenge in life.

At the end of the day, the children played new age curling and sit-down volleyball, led by the incredible John Willis, from Power2Inspire, which got very competitive. As it was the end of Paralympic week, Dan joined in with the school’s closing ceremony to announce the winning team. John Willis, Dan Powell and Mr Wade announced the winning team and each child received a medal. By this point, Elmo was very tired after receiving most of the attention all day!

The visit to Quilters Junior School was fantastic, and it was incredible to watch the impact Dan had on the children. Dan related his story to the five ways to positive mental wellbeing and taught the children to never give up. We will remember our visit to Quilters Junior School and remember to put on our own cape’s of bravery when we are facing a challenge.

What cape will you wear when you are next faced with a challenge?

To find out more about our Mintridge Mentoring Programmes that can be delivered remotely, or if you are interested in a school or club visit from one of our Mintridge Ambassadors, then please get in touch with The Mintridge Foundation, via any of our social media channels, or send an email to katie@mintridge.org.uk.

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