Make Sport Fun

stickK Allows You To Put A Contract On Yourself

stickK is designed to promote a healthier lifestyle by allowing users to create “Commitment Contracts” that oblige them to follow through with commitments such as exercise and quitting smoking.

stickK was developed by Yale University economists Dean Karlan and Ian Ayres who tested the effectiveness of Commitment Contracts through extensive field research. Economic and behavioural research before Karlan and Ayres considered the effectiveness of the model, and their own testing found that people who put stakes (money or reputation) on the table are far more likely to achieve any goal they set for themselves.

Taking out a commitment contract though doesn’t mean a thing unless there is a penalty for breaking the contract, and stickK covers that as well. Users can set up a contract to include payments to charities if they fail to meet their contracts, and friends can be used to make the final call on the result as well, reducing the chance that users will lie about the result of a contract.

Steven D Levitt of Freakonomics fame wrote about stickK in January (Ayres is an occasional Freakonomics Blog guest blogger) and approved of the concept, a strong endorsement for the site.

Rampworx, Liverpool to host first UK Extreme Sports Spring Break Party

This looks pretty interesting, and a good example of making sport fun. Rampworx recently decided to host the UK’s first Extreme Sports Spring Break party on Friday 22nd May. Might be worth promoting to any networks of young people.

Embracing the American model this Spring break event will consist of outrageous teenage fun and downright debauchery. Rampworx takes place in just one adrenalin and soft drink fuelled evening crammed with a host of fun filled activities revolving around music, dance, sports and art. The event, the first of its kind in the UK is being supported by Juice FM, Casio – G Shock, Red Bull, CALM, Raw TV, Billabong and Nandos.

Juice FM will be broadcasting live and direct from the party, whilst RAW TV (Channel 4) show will be recording the sporting spring break shenanigans exploding inside. Top riders from across Europe will mingle with local BMXer’s skateboarders and In Line skaters to celebrate the completion of the spring term and the launch of the summer season.

Outside, the Juice FM stage will house 5 live bands; including KOF who has supported Akon, Dizzee Rascal, Sway and Ms Dynamite. There will be a street dance comp and local DJ. Toko drummers consisting of young people from Rock Ferry and Tranmere Primary School will be thrashing out summer rhythmic beats as hundreds of expected revelers get involved in a range of alternative activities, such as the G Shock bus, a Billabong sponsored surf ride, a Red Bull rodeo bull, a 28ft climbing wall and graffiti wall.

Rampworx is a registered children’s charity and the largest indoor skatepark in the UK, catering for BMX, In Line skating and skateboarding. Each week an average of 1000 young people pass through its doors to participate in a range of activities ranging from extreme sports, coaching and alternative activities ranging from drama, photography, music, video, graffiti art, health schemes and anti crime initiatives.

For more information check out www.rampworx.com or contact Tony Berry on 0151 666 2224.

Liverpool's Challenge

Liverpool Primary Care Trust are running an interesting campaign at the moment. They're helping people get active, eat healthier, and are aiming to help Liverpool lose one million pounds of weight.

So far people have pledged 615,782 pounds of weight.

On the website Liverpudlians can record their goal for healthy living, pledge their pounds, get a free starter pack, see other's pledges, hear what celebrities think, read success stories, access free support services to get help and find out about Liverpool's Challenge events.

Change4Life update

The latest Change4Life update has come out from the central Change4Life team.

Some of the key findings are that at the end of February 57% of the public have heard of Change4Life, and 63% of mothers have heard of it.

For the full performance statistics

click here

.

There are now numerous resources for helping you to promote Change4Life and to use it to promote your own activities - details of all of them are available

here

. Obviously promotingactivity.com remains the place we would recommend above all else.

Next phases of campaign

Rooting the Behaviours

The current phase of the Change4Life campaign focuses around rooting the behaviours. One of eight behavioural changes is being promoted in the latest TV commercial. The ‘Me Size Meals’ advert focuses on the fact that parents often give their kids the same-sized portions as themselves when really they need much less (in research this was seen by mums as one of the behaviours they would find easy to change). They will post the new advert onto the DH YouTube page this week.

‘We’re In’ activity

The ‘We’re In’ phase of the campaign was due to begin in May and run until September, but it is being pushed back and it is more likely that this will begin in the second week of June.

Part of this activity involves access to regular space in local press titles across England.

For more details of the next phases of the campaign and more overall campaign info

click here

.

Promoting promotingactivity.com

If you want to tell others about promotingactivity.com then here's another useful tool to help you do so.

Download promotingactivity.com guide

It's an 8 page document that explains all elements of promotingactivity.com and was put together by Katie Melia and her colleagues from Get Active in Northamptonshire. Thanks Katie.

Technorati Tags: promotingactivity.com

The future is here - now you can network online

I’ve spent much of the last few weeks travelling round the country running Promoting Activity workshops. It’s been a fantastic (if exhausting) experience. I’ve met a lot of great people, learnt about some of the fantastic work being done, and got some really useful feedback about promotingactivity.com.

One of the things that makes workshops, seminars and conferences so useful is the ability to network and meet other people. But it seems crazy that the only way to make new contacts is by happening to meet them at a workshop. We live in a digital age, but there doesn’t seem to be an easy way to make contact with others involved in promoting activity.

Enter LinkedIn.

LinkedIn is Facebook for business (with 38 million members). Fear not - no-one will be updating you on what they got up to on the weekend, instead it allows you to:

• keep in touch with your current contacts and find new ones
• Find phone numbers and email addresses of useful contacts
• See what the people you’re meeting look like before you get there
• Share good practice

And to help all of us involved in promoting sport I’ve set up the LinkedIn Promoting Activity group. You can set up a LinkedIn account and join this group by going to http://www.linkedin.com/e/vgh/1876778/. If you’re not a member then it will ask you to join up, which you can do in 1-2 minutes. I’ve pre-approved everybody getting this email as a member, but please do send the link on to others involved in promoting activity. I've included a short paragraph for your newsletter in case that's helpful.

The future is here - now you can network online
LinkedIn is the Facebook for business. There’s a new group set up to make it easier for you to network online with others working to promote activity in England. To join simply go to http://www.linkedin.com/e/vgh/1876778/ and sign up. It will help you find new contacts and keep in touch with old ones.

promotingactivity.com update - Search tool is back up and running.
The search  tool was showing a yellow screen instead of the map for certain activities, and that’s fixed now. We’ve got 16,000 entries so far, and should reach 40,000 by the end of May.