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At the end of 2019 we were approached by a mum keen to run skateboarding lessons for a group of children in home education. We duly obliged and set up a regular Tuesday afternoon session for them at Charlton Park. We provided skateboards, pads and helmets where required and we had a range of ages and abilities present. We had the skatepark to ourselves which was handy, and it was a great atmosphere to have the parents present and getting involved. When we had wet weather we decamped to the Aircraft Circus in Woolwich Dockyard to run the lessons indoor, which worked well.

Skateboarding is a great activity for children in home education for a number of reasons that go beyond learning the sport itself:

• Learning social skills as part of an activity without the pressure of team sports.
• It teaches the positive aspect of making mistakes. We first learn to fall safely and then are encouraged to experiment, and make mistakes. This accelerates the learning process. Failing fast is the key to progress. 
• It teaches the child to be independent, and self reliant.
• It’s a self-directed activity. After initial guidance there is freedom to experiment.

We are running more sessions for home schooled participants in 2020. We are looking for participants from Greenwich, Lewisham, Bexley and Bromley London Boroughs. Please get in touch with us and we can see what we can provide.

At the beginning of the month I ran a private lesson with London based professionals Justin and Lingling who are in their mid 20s. We met at Whitegrounds skatepark which is local to them. Whitegrounds is a street style concrete park with plenty of ledges, banks and irregular transitions with some challenging lines. It is situated under a railway arch close to London Bridge station so is convenient for wet weather.

Justin and Lingling were absolute beginners and we provided pro skateboards and pads & helmets for them to try skateboarding. We progressed very quickly, learning to stand on our boards, and push before moving on to slaloming round obstacles to fine tune pushing and turning in concert.

We then worked our way up to going up the transitions and coming out fakie (backwards) and started to learn to kickturn on the flat which lead to some early attempts at kickturn on the transition.

Whitegrounds is a public skatepark run by the London borough of Southwark and is usually open during the day until 5pm. It can be a bit leaky however. It is also next door to Hop Kingdom which is an indoor wooden skatepark which is well worth a visit for a beverage and a roll around if you find yourself there.

On Sat 25th May Dell and myself ran a skateboarding party for Harrison who was celebrating his 9th birthday with 15 of his friends at Charlton Skatepark. Harrison got a schoolofskate.co.uk T-Shirt and as you can see from the pictures, much fun was had by all.

We divided the group up into those who could ride and those who couldn’t, with myself taking the majority of the group through one hour of tuition following the familiar format, with:

• Warm up
• Learning to stand on our board; with our push and riding stances
• Learning a controlled dismount
• Learning to push along and stop
• Learning to steer
• Learning to go down the slope.

After the lesson we gave the kids half hour free skate to do what they wanted before they decamped to the old cottage coffee shop cafe, where Michael and Mimi laid on panini and drinks for the party guests, and after lunch they did the birthday cake.

Salley, Harrison’s mum, had the following to say about the day:

“Thank you for a very cool birthday party and thanks to School of Skate all the kids have a new hobby.  It was an awesome afternoon with many parents texting to say how much they enjoyed the party, Stuart and Dell could not have been more attentive.  We will definitely recommend School of Skate for future parties.”

You can book a private group lesson for up to 10 with us now. If you have a bigger party, like Harrison, or have any special requests we may be able to accomodate you. Please contact us if you have any questions.