Game Sense: Pedagogy for Performance, Participation and Enjoyment (Routledge Studies in Physical Education and Youth Sport)

Game Sense is an exciting and innovative approach to coaching and physical education that places the game at the heart of the session. It encourages the player to develop skills in a realistic context, to become more tactically aware, to make better decisions and to have more fun. Game Sense is a comprehensive, research-informed introduction to the Game Sense approach that defines and explores key concepts and essential pedagogical theory, and that offers an extensive series of practical examples and plans for using Game Sense in real teaching and coaching situations.

The first section of the book helps the reader to understand how learning occurs and how this informs player-centred pedagogy. It also explains the relationship between Game Sense and other approaches to Teaching Games for Understanding. The second section of the book demonstrates how the theory can be applied in practice, providing a detailed, step-by-step guide to using Game Sense in eleven sports, including soccer, basketball, field hockey and softball.

No other book explores the Game Sense approach in such depth, or combines theory and innovative practical techniques. Game Sense is invaluable reading for all students of physical education or sports coaching, any in-service physical education teacher or any sports coach working with children or young people.

Richard Light is Professorial Research Fellow in the School of Health Sciences, University of Ballarat, Australia. Richard was a foundation member of the Teaching Games for Understanding Task Force within AIESEP (International Association for Physical Education in Higher Education) and the convenor of the second international TGfU conference in Melbourne in 2003 and the 2006 Asia-Pacific Conference for Teaching Physical Education and Sport for Understanding in Sydney, Australia. He coordinated the pre-conference TGfU symposia at the 2006 AIESEP World Congress in Finland, the 2008 AIESEP Congress in Japan and the 2008 ISCPES conference at the University of Macau. Richard has edited volumes on TGfU and the Games Approach to sport coaching.