The trouble with school sport

Britain's future Olympic sprinters are still in Primary School

Schools need to improve their talent-spotting if Britain wants to raise the next generation of Olympic athletes.

That's the verdict of experts from the school inspection service, Ofsted, which has been assessing how well a national programme for talented youngsters has been working.

Ofsted says it's worried that teachers don't spot children who have not fulfilled their potential - but could excel if they were given the right support.

This morning, Breakfast asked: what's the trouble with school sport?

We talked to the sports minister Richard Caborn.

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"Our gifted and talented scheme has only been up and running for 11 months," he told Breakfast.

"It's a system for identifying the Olympians of 2012 and 2016 and it builds on what we are already doing in schools.

"We have 400 sports colleges linked to primary and secondary schools.

The aim is to give every child two hours of sport or PE each week, from the ages of five to 16. There is also a talented athletes scheme for those who finish education and start college or work.

"We've got a structure which will not be hit and miss any more, to identify and nurture that talent, " he added.

We talked to the head of one school which was singled out for praise: David Binnie of Streetley School in Sutton Coldfield.

Inspectors from Ofsted say that schools which do best at sport have good links with local clubs, organise plenty of sports sessions before and after school and let pupils organise their homework around training sessions.

But it added that specialist sports colleges need to identify children who haven't fulfilled their potential.

The best PE teachers looked for "rough diamonds" who excelled in one sport or had good spatial awareness and tried to develop their talents