The Effects of Play Practice Instruction on the Badminton Content Knowledge of a Cohort of Chinese Physical Education Majors

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of Play Practice instruction on the badminton content knowledge and skill of a cohort of Chinese physical education majors. Method: Seventy-two second-year students participated in semester-long courses following either the principles of Play Practice or skill-focused instruction. A control/comparison group experimental design with pre- and postmeasures was used in this study. Separate analyses of variance with repeated measures (Time × Group) were conducted to examine the effects of Play Practice and skill-focused instruction for each of four dependent variables: (a) forehand clear, (b) tactical understanding, (c) game performance, and (d) specialized content knowledge. Results: Students from both conditions made significant improvements in all four variables across the semester. However, students in the Play Practice condition showed significantly greater gains in tactical understanding, game performance, and specialized content knowledge. In particular, while 75% of students who experienced Play Practice reached the 3.0 benchmark score for adequate specialized content knowledge, only 8% of students in skill-focused instruction reached this standard.

The Impact of Play Practice on Chinese Physical Education Pre-Service Teachers Badminton Content Knowledge

OBJECTIVES This study examined the development of Chinese pre-service physical education teachers’ technical skill, tactical understanding, game performance (common content knowledge - CCK), and specialized content knowledge (SCK) during a badminton course incorporating Play Practice instruction.METHODS Participants were 36 pre-service teachers (31 males, 5 females: age 21 ± 1.0) majoring in physical education at a university in central China. The students completed a 24 lesson course after a 16 weeks semester. A typical lesson (90 minutes) included a 10-minute warm-up, followed by instruction in two or three technical skills or tactics for 50-55 minutes. The final 25-minutes included the Play Practice aspect of the lesson - a specific game-based challenge to reinforce a technical or tactical aspect of badminton play. The challenge included the three typical pedagogies of Play Practice: focusing, shaping, and enhancing. The French clear test, tactical understanding in badminton, Game Performance Assessment Instrument (GPAI), and student-generated content maps were used to respectively monitor changes in technical skills, tactical understanding, game performance, and specialized content knowledge before and after the course. Parametric statistics were used to compare student outcomes.RESULTS Statistically significant differences were found on all measures from pre- to post-test, with all showing large effect sizes. In particular, over 75% of students achieved the benchmark depth of SCK following the course.CONCLUSIONS The inclusion of Play Practice within a sport instruction course can contribute to various elements that are needed to promote the CCK and SCK of pre-service physical education students.

STUDENTS’ TACTICAL UNDERSTANDING DURING A HYBRID SPORT EDUCATION/STEP-GAME APPROACH MODEL VOLLEYBALL TEACHING UNIT

A investigação nos modelos instrucionais tem enaltecido o impacto positivo do Modelo de Educação Desportiva e do Modelo de Abordagem Progressiva ao Jogo no desenvolvimento técnico e tático dos alunos, assim como no desempenho geral no jogo. Todavia, a análise do conhecimento tático dos alunos neste âmbito tem sido escassa. O presente estudo tem como propósito analisar o conhecimento tático declarativo dos alunos durante uma unidade híbrida desses dois modelos na modalidade de voleibol. Noventa e seis alunos sem experiência prévia nos dois modelos participaram numa época desportiva com 24 aulas. Foi desenvolvido um teste de vídeo para analisar o desenvolvimento do conhecimento tático declarativo dos alunos, o qual foi aplicado antes e depois da unidade. Todos os alunos melhoraram nos conteúdos táticos ensinados, o que pode encontrar explicação no trabalho colaborativo em equipas, na possibilidade dos alunos participarem noutros papéis para além de jogadores e nos processos instrucionais, características dos dois modelos.