Changing the Culture of PE in Cook Island Schools.

We had a successful 3 ½ day workshop in the holidays, with a total of 25 participants from schools all over the Southern Group.

We covered a range of ways to change the competitive culture in our schools to move away from a Sports focus in PE, and focus more on the Education part, where teaching Essential Skills in PE, such as Problem Solving, Communication Skills, and Social-cooperative skills leads the focus away from competition and winning.

Vanessa Palmer from Tereora helped with this session, and put our teachers through a lot of different activities, both physically and mentally challenging.

Following on from this, Natasha Simpson from Manawatu College in Foxton, New Zealand and I , introduced a new teaching approach, ‘Teaching Games for Understanding’ (TGfU), which is a model that fosters tactical awareness and skill instruction, moving away from our skills only based teaching that we have in the Cooks.

Teaching Games for Understanding (TGfU)

The TGfU approach is most effective when it is student-centered and game-centered, which we believe will work well in our schools over here.

It’s main focus being on the teacher asking the right questions, to get the student thinking about why they did something, what they should do, and how can they do it to make the game run smoother, and achieve the objectives. TGfU originated from the belief that the more traditional approach to teaching, which typically involved a skill being introduced, mastered and then incorporated into a modified small game, was largely ineffective.

Thus leading to;

a. a large percentage of children achieving little success due to the emphasis on performance, i.e. “doing’,

b. The majority of school leavers knowing very little about games,

c. The production of supposedly skilful players who in fact possess inflexible techniques and poor decision-making capacity (Bunker & Thorpe, 1982).

1. The first stage is the introduction of ‘the game’. The game is designed to meet the developmental needs of the students and the learning outcomes the teacher wants to achieve. The underlying principles outlined in this article are the basis for developing these games.

2. Game appreciation requires the students to understand the rules and structure of the game.

3. Tactical awareness is concerned with students developing an understanding of the tactics involved in playing the game (e.g. moving players to create space)

4. Making appropriate decisions concerns students deciding what they should do and then deciding how they are going to do it (e.g. we need to stop the spiker scoring … we will put up two blockers to mark them)

5. Skill execution is concerned with specific skills or movement (e.g. the skill of blocking in volleyball)

6. Performance is concerned with performing competently within the game situation.

This model can be applied to four categories of games; Target, Net/Wall, Striking/Fielding and Invasion games.

Target – are team games where the purpose is to invade the opponent’s territory, with the aim being to score more points within the time limit than the opposing team. Examples, Netball, Rugby, Touch, Basketball, Soccer

Net/Wall – are games that involve a net or a wall. The aim of these types of games, being to send an object into an opponent’s court so that it cannot be played at or returned within the court boundaries. Examples, Tennis, Volleyball, Squash

Striking/Fielding – are games where a contest develops between the fielding and batting team, with the aim being to score more runs than the other team using the number of innings and time allowed. Examples, Cricket, Softball.

Target – are games where the aim is to place a projectile near, or in a target in order to have the best possible score. Examples, Golf, Lawn Bowls.

During the workshop, all teachers had a chance to plan, participate in, teach and evaluate a variety of these activities, and were both physically and mentally exhausted by the end of it.

It was awesome to see the teachers all working together to solve problems, and sharing ideas, as we had teachers from different levels of experience and abilities.

The aim now being that the Lead Teachers will try these new approaches in their own classes, and pass on the knowledge to the rest of their staff in time, and shifting the focus from winning the inter-school sports tournaments during the term, to adding new things to the year overview, and creating a more inclusive, positive learning environment for all.