Site Content ©2015 Matt Jolly, Gee King, Josh Fewtrell, Jemma Aldridge all rights reserved. Photographs ©2015 Paul Jolly all rights reserved.

When we first got the project I was feeling very optimistic. It sounded like we were going to be selling a skipping scheme and our creativity would come from our presentations and the event days. It also seemed very straightforward; we already knew exactly what needed to be done and what our end goal was to be.

It was exciting to meet Katherine for the first time and have the official pack sent to us (as well as the t-shirts) and gave me lots of enthusiasm for the task ahead. However, several months later I did not feel the same way. We had phoned countless schools with only limited replies. The schools that we did go to sounded very interested at the time, but in the end the decided not to participate in the scheme. After months of hard work we had got nowhere. It looked like we were not going to finish our project.

As a group we decided to change our focus onto making a book about things to do with rope and string. With the initial project I was feeling very disheartened because of the lack of progress, but the new focus I was feeling enthusiastic again. The first day when we sat down and brainstormed ideas, it felt like the first day of doing our creativity project. We were actually using our imaginations and creating original ideas, instead of using somebody else’s.

Unfortunately, creating the book presented its own set of problems. How were we going to write our own book? How were we going to get it published? How would we be able to edit it and make it look professional? The book was also an unconventional creativity project and I was worried about how we would be able to show making change happen. Every other group was working in a school, interacting with teachers and children, making a positive change to a group of individuals. I didn’t think that the book alone was enough to show this too.

Therefore, in order to overcome this problem I emailed schools in the local area to see if they would be interested in taking part in a club focusing on rope activities. One school replied and was very accommodating. I found taking part in the club to be a really enjoyable experience. It was nice to see our ideas being used by real children and receiving positive feedback. It was also nice to have an impact on the children by introducing them to activities that they had never tried before. When we left the school we felt that we had made a difference and left a small legacy behind.

The rest of my time was split between creating the portfolio and helping to edit the book. I found it difficult at first to write accessible instructions as I was used to solely writing academic essays. However, I soon got used to a change of style and had fun being creative with my writing. Finishing the book and the portfolio meant that there was a mad rush to get everything completed on time, but the end product was worth it.

Josh

Matt

Jemma

Gee