It’s something of a cliché that men like to play sports and that even men who don’t play sports like to talk about them. Watching sports and commenting on the performance of players and teams is a favourite pastime for men. Knowing the basic rules of key team games is an important part of a boy’s mental furniture. Boys who have no taste or interest for sport sometimes feel left out. Just like never learning to sing in a tune, a problem for so many young people today … this is the stuff one needs to do at a young age for it it stick.
That’s why at Chavagnes International College the curriculum takes into to account this commpmonplace of masculine identity. The College believes that team sports exist to channel and perfect masculine characteristics that are useful both to boys themselves and society as a whole.
Boys’ natural energy and agression need an outlet, and they also need to be channelled so as to enable dynamic and successful teamwork. Boys need to learn to let others display their talents, to know when to stand back and let a better man do the job (as in remembering to pass the boy more likey to score a goal, for example). These are habits that can only be learned by “doing”. That’s why the values associated with sportsmanship are best envinced in the young by actual participation in sport.
Chavagnes has a set of minimal requirements that drive its sports programme. They aim at an avoidance of the polarisation between intelletuals and sportsmen, so as to produce good all-rounders:
- An experience of a variety of sports, so that at the very least, he can become an informed spectator.
- Teams that will participate against local and other boarding schools
- A sense of sportsmanship, often lacking in today’s drive for ‘professionalism’.
- A taste for sport and an ability to enjoy it, even for those who find it difficult.
- An understanding of the value of being physically fit to be mentally more efficient.
For more informarion about Chavagnes International College, the leading Catholic boarding school for boys, visit their website at www.chavagnes.org . They celebrate their 20th anniversary this year.
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