Imagine the Difference: Gotcha, Boccia!

Story starter for Key Stage 2

Alex is a wheelchair user and goes to a Special School. He started playing Boccia two years ago — and he's pretty good at it. But when Mr Plowright, the PE teacher, arranges for Alex and his fellow players to play with children from the local primary school, Alex is nervous. But they all have a great time and are soon having matches with lots of other schools. Alex is chosen to represent his school in the first National Schools Boccia Championship and really wants to get to the finals.

I loved Boccia from the moment I first played it. No, that’s not true. I loved it even before I’d played it. It was the name I fell in love with. You say it like ‘got-cha’, and that’s what my dad always says to me as he lifts me out of my wheelchair or gives me a hug. ‘Gotcha,’ he says, with a warm smile in his voice.

I started playing Boccia two years ago when I was eight. Mr Plowright, our PE teacher, introduced us to the game in the hall one day. I go to a Special School and we do loads of PE.

Mr Plowright said he was fed up with us not being able to take part in competitions and tournaments like everyone else, and that it was high time we showed the children in other schools how to play a really brilliant new game called Boccia. And that was it; I was hooked.

Boccia is quite an easy game to play, and there aren’t too many silly rules. But it’s quite a lot harder if you use a wheelchair and can only move the top half of your body like me. You play it on a specially marked-out hard surface about the size of a badminton court. You have six red balls, six blue balls and one white target ball, called the jack. The idea is to get as many Boccia balls as close as possible to the white target ball. It’s brilliant because you can play it one-on-one, in pairs or in teams of three, and players can roll, push, kick or throw their ball. You can even play it if you can’t move your arms very much because you can use a ramp to roll the ball down with your head.

I hope you don’t think I’m showing off, but I’m quite good at Boccia. After we’d played a few times Mr Plowright said I was a natural. It felt good to be a natural at something.

At the start of the PE lesson one day, Mr Plowright said he thought we were good enough now to teach the children from the primary school down the road how to play Boccia. At first we didn’t think this was such a great idea because although the kids from Park End Primary are the same age as us, they are different in many other ways. For a start, only one person there uses a wheelchair.

It felt funny the first time the kids from Park End came to play Boccia with us. They looked even shyer and more nervous than we were. We soon got into it though, and Mr Plowright and our helpers put us into twos and threes; some of us in wheelchairs, some of us not.

Our new friends from Park End said Boccia was harder than it looked, but they liked it and we arranged to play again the next week. We gave each other a cheer at the end. We played Boccia a lot after that with our new mates, and had a great laugh.

Last year, some older students from the High School, who were training to be Sports Leaders, came to help us set up an after-school Boccia club, and to organise our first proper match against another school. I was really proud to be chosen as the Team Captain.

We won that first game easily, and on the way home we sang songs on the bus to celebrate. After that, loads of other schools started playing Boccia so we had a bit of competition. We were even in the local paper when BB Sportswear sponsored us, paying for our kit and travel expenses.

Now, two years and countless games of Boccia later, I’m off to London tomorrow to represent my school in the first National Schools Boccia Championship.

I don’t really think I’ll win because I’m the youngest player by two years, but I’ll give it my best shot. Only wheelchair users are allowed to play in the nationals, but my best friend from Park End is coming along to support me. Mum and Dad and Mr Plowright will be there too.

I’ll be disappointed if I don’t get to the finals, and of course I dream of playing for my country one day, but I don’t really mind all that much. I know it may sound funny but the thing I still love most about Boccia is the name. These days when my dad lifts me out of my wheelchair or gives me a hug he says, ‘Gotcha, Boccia!’