Game Sense for Teaching and Coaching: International Perspectives

Sport coaching has grown significantly as an area of research interest with an expanding number of sport coaching programs offered. The past decade or so has also seen significant interest in games-based approaches to coaching and teaching games. On a global level, Game Sense is one of the most recognized athlete-centred approaches for team sports, probably close behind Teaching Games for Understanding.

Game Sense for Coaching and Teaching provides an understanding of how an Australian approach to coaching has grown and developed as it has been taken up across the globe. While the focus is on Game Sense, the book also offers insights into how any coaching or physical education (PE) teaching approach changes as it is adapted to different contexts across the world, examining the theoretical, historical and philosophical foundations of sport coaching and teaching in schools.

This book is particularly useful for undergraduate and post-graduate sport coaching and PE courses but is also likely to be of interest for all practicing sports coaches or physical education teachers and lecturers.

Richard L. Light is author of Game Sense: Pedagogy for participation performance and enjoyment (2013, Routledge) and Professor of Sport Coaching in the College of Education, Health and Human Development at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand. He is a prominent international figure working in sport pedagogy with a focus on athlete-centred approaches. He is well known for his research and writing on Game Sense over the past twenty years and has published many high impact research books on sport coaching and learning. His most recent books include: Applied Positive Pedagogy in sport coaching (2021, Routledge) and Positive Pedagogy for sport coaching (2nd edn) (2019, Routledge), both with Stephen Harvey; Stories of Indigenous success in Australian sport: Journeys to the AFL and NRL, with John Evans (2018, Palgrave MacMillan); and Positive Pedagogy for sport coaching: Athlete-centred coaching for individual sports (2017, Routledge).

Christina Curry PhD is a former Head of Health and Physical Education Department at a secondary school in Sydney, Australia. She completed a PhD in 2013 on the implementation of Teaching Games for Understanding (TGfU) at an independent secondary school in Sydney. She is at Western Sydney University, Australia, where she was Director of Secondary Education and now teaches and conducts research on Leadership, Health and Physical Education, with a focus on Game Sense. She is regularly invited to conduct workshops on Game Sense and Positive Pedagogy for sport coaching, and was involved in its early development.