Sport Pedagogy

Book excerpt: Sport Pedagogy offers an essential starting point for anyone who cares about sport, education and young people. It offers invaluable theoretical and practical guidance for studying to become an effective teacher or coach, and for anyone who wants to inspire children and young people to engage in and enjoy sport for life. The book also focuses on you as a learner in sport, prompting you to reflect critically on the ways in which your early learning experiences might affect your ability to diagnose the learning needs of young people with very different needs. Sport Pedagogy is about learning in practice. It refers both the ways in which children and young people learn and the pedagogical knowledge and skills that teachers and coaches need to support them to learn effectively. Sport pedagogy is the study of the place where sport and education come together. The study of sport pedagogy has three complex dimensions that interact to form each pedagogical encounter: Knowledge in context - what is regarded as essential or valuable knowledge to be taught, coached or learnt is contingent upon historical, social and political contextual factors that define practice; Learners and learning -at the core of sport pedagogy is expertise in complex learning theories, and a deep understanding of diversity and its many impacts on the ways in which young learners can learn; Teachers/teaching and coaches/coaching - effective teachers and coaches are lifelong learners who can harness the power of sport for diverse children and young people. Gaining knowledge and understanding of the three dimensional concept of sport pedagogy is the first step towards ensuring that the rights of large numbers of children and young people to effective learning experiences in and through sport are not denied. The book is organised into three sections: background and context; young people as diverse learners; the professional responsibility of teachers and coaches. Features of each chapter include: research extracts, ‘comments’ to summarise key points, individual and group learning tasks, suggested resources for further reading, and reference lists to enable you to follow-up points of interest. This book provides you with some of the prior knowledge you need to make best use of teaching materials, coaching manuals and other resources. In so doing you, as a teacher or coach, will be well placed to offer an effective and professional learning service to children and young people in sport.