When I was a teenager I was a bit of a tomboy. If the boys were playing football I'd join in and so would most of my friends. I remember there were a couple of girls who would never join in. They had made a conscious decision to act "grown up" which meant they sat with the adults and either had their own conversations about clothes, make-up, music etc or else they would join in with the adult conversations.
Back then they were in the minority. Now I think it is increasingly rare to find girls that will join in with the boys, in fact rare to find girls that will join in with any activity unless it has been organised specifically for them.
I always take an inflatable beach ball to my first session with any new group of girls. I have some great ice-breakers that help everyone feel at ease. I have never had a group that haven't enjoyed playing with the beach ball. In fact some groups enjoy the beach ball so much that it becomes a central focus of all our sessions with big complaints if I leave it at home to try something different for a week.
So why, if the teen girls I work with, enjoy playing with the ball so much don't we see groups of girls down the park playing with a ball? Just about every park contains a group of lads playing football but where are the girls?
You find girl's football teams in every town in the country but still you rarely see girls kicking a ball around "just for fun". You see girls netball teams in just about every school yet at lunchtime when the boys have set up their jumpers as goal posts and organised an ad hoc game of football the girls are sitting talking.
We need to remind teen girls that it is OK to play. A thirteen year old is still a child, a child should be playing. Even the 16 and 17 year olds that come to my sessions love playing ball.
Maggie Ayre is a Personal Trainer and Nutrition Adviser for Teenage Girls. Her goal is to get every teen girl active. Not only does fitness and good nutrition lead to a healthy body it also has been proven to increase self-confidence, self-esteem and even lead to better exam results!
