10 year old Mathew came to help at a Starkick session and left impacted and with a new perspective on what it means to have a disability. With maturity beyond his years he wrote the following account of his time volunteering at Starkick and what it meant to him. 

"WE ARE MORE ALIKE THAN DIFFERENT"

Date: 7th August 2016
Author: Mathew
Age: 10
 

On Sunday the 7th of August Adam, Jack, Cohen, some boys from my football team and I went down to Coolbinia Bombers Junior Football Club to help our coach Rob with a group called Starkick. Starkick is an all abilities football team for boys and girls with special needs or disabilities between the ages of 5 and 12. Their mantra is ‘If you want to play, we’ll find a way’

 When we got there Rob had a little talk to everyone and then we got straight into it. The first drill was obstacle dodgeball. The parents stood on the outside and threw the balls. At first we were the Star Wars Force Fields for the kids, to protect them. 

For the second part of the game we would hold up the obstacles and the kids were allowed to tackle us. The person that loved that drill the most was a boy called Flyn. Whenever we got bumped we would fall over. It was a very rainy and muddy day so we got very dirty.

 The next drill we did was the bumping bag. The kids would run and bump the bag then kick for goal. We were on the bumping bags so we got knocked down a lot. It was fun. 

The final drill was kick to kick. I was with a boy called Aiden. While we were kicking Aiden talked to me about how to kick a football, his favourite team, favourite player and what he loved about Starkick. He said he loved playing the game at the end, just like I do. 

 When we finished the drills we played a game of football. At the start we all got to run through a banner, then we played the game. Only the Starkick kids were allowed to kick and we had to handball. It was a fun game to play. All the kids were laughing and scoring lots of goals.

At the end we all gave out an award. I gave my award to a boy called Flyn who loved the bumping bags.

Afterwards we had a photo with the Starkick kids. We asked Rob some questions then a parent and a volunteer told us what Starkick meant to them.  These are a few questions that we asked; 

 Q. How long has Starkick been going for?  2 years, it started in 2015

 Q. Why did you start Starkick?   A boy called Archer who is in a wheel chair used to come down and watch his two brothers play but he could never play himself. We thought, should we try and find a team for him. So we made one and then all these other kids wanted to play too and wanted to be part of the club.

Q. What are the various challenges that the Starkick participants face?  Some of the kids can’t see, others, their legs might not work as well as others and other kids might not be able to concentrate as well as others.

Q. What has been your most memorable moment?  Last year we had our first buddy day with the Year 10 team. A boy called Aiden could never kick a football. He would come to Starkick every week but his dad could never get him to kick a football. It was near the end of the year and a year 10 player taught him how to kick for the first time ever.

From volunteering as part of our Year 5 ‘Men for Others’ tasks, I learnt that even though we all have different abilities, we are more alike than different because we all love to;

Kick a goal
Take a mark
Play with our friends
Run around with our Mum and Dad
Play in the rain and get muddy and dirty
Bump the bags hard
Play and win a game of football 
Play kick to kick 
Have a chat  - Play sport 
Run around 
Learn about Football
Run through a banner
Laugh and have fun

It felt good to volunteer and be able to give something back. We had fun. I hope we can do it again.

Matthew
Year 5 White 
(Age 10)
Season 2016