Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

Abstract

In this study, complexity of content in teaching invasion games in the Guidelines for the revised Japanese Course of Studies(2009,2010) was analized. In the Guidelines, complexity of invasion games is shown with 6 stages in every 2 years . In the first stage(1-2 grade), manipulation of ball, finding free space and marking opponents in simple games are shown. In the 2nd stage(3-4 grade), in simple modified invasion games, direction of the body to the goal and moving into space for supporting are shown. In the 3rd stage(5-6 grade), passing to free teammate, keeping ball, shooting after moving into free space and standing between oponent and goal for defense in modified games based on invasion sport dicipline were shown. In the 4th stage(7-8 gade), using free space in front of the goal, shotting in free space and decision making on passing are shown. In the 5th stage(9-10the grade), making space in front of goal and using it effectively are shown. Moving away from teammates for making space for them and covering space in front of goal are shown. In the 6th garde(11-12 grade), all examples for invasion game are related with off the ball movement.

INTRODUCTION

So much time is allocated for games teaching in physical education(Mitchell, et al.1999,p.1), but one say alway that content in games teaching is not so clear. So many years, one tries to make it clear.Even through the idea of TGfU and so on are now introduced in the Course of Study or national curriculum in many countries(MEXT,2008;You, 2007;Curriculum Planning & Development Division Ministry of Education Singapore,2006 ), one should ask what would be the adequate content worth to learn in each developmental stage. To answer this question, a tactical framework for content in teaching games would be helpful. Also making standards- based program is one of the alternatives to solve this problem. Indeed, the standards, assessment, and accountability movement in USA involves establishing clear expectation for what students should know and be able to do(Rink et al.,2003,p.471).

It aims to determine best content and pedagogical strategies to help student’s learning outcome. Its primary goal should be student’s enjoyment and engagement in something worth to learn. In this sense, standards-based program design is a process for designing educational programs toward the end of student learning(Lambert, 2003). In the USA, the national standards movement did not approach the task of educational reform through the establishment of a national curriculum or predetermined course of study;rather, it spoke of competencies, defining what a student should know and be able to do. The expectation is that all students in every school should be able to reach these standards with adequate support and sustained effort(NASPE,2004,p.1). In this context, one could find two kinds of standards;content standard and performance standard. Content standard is defined what students should know and be able to do. They identified the knowledge and skills essential to a discipline that students were expected to learn. A performance standard described how good is good enough to indicate the levels of achievement that students were expected to acquire in the content standards(NASPE,2004,p.1).

In the revised Japanese Course of Study, games categories are firstly introduced to claffify games from elementary schools to senior high schools to show content in games more clearly. Categoris are invasion games, net games and baseball typed game. Target games is not introduced in physical education for common pupils and students(Tab.1). For effective implementation of the Course of Study, in the Guideline for the revised Japanese Course of Studies, it is recommended to introduce developmentally adequate modified games in games teaching.

Table 1. Games Categories and examples of games in the revised Course of Study for PE

Table 1. Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

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On the other hand, for assessing learinig outcome, governmant request teachers to set achievement standard based on their situation. To set achievement standard, one should check complexity of tasks in games to be achieved. In the literature on TGfU, many ideas on complexity of content in teaching games are shown. (Belka, 2007;Mitschel,2003,2006).

Also in these studies, levels of game complexity or levels of tactical complexity are distingished, but it is hard to know in which garde one can teach which level of complexity. Also little evidence on it is shown. In this study, complexity of content in teaching invasion games in the Guidelines for the revised Japanese Course of Studies(MEXT, 2008,2009) is analized. Based on such analysis, it was tried to make its features clear.

METHDOLOGY

In Japan, content to be taught in physical education is described in the Course of Studie. It is divided into 3 domains:motor, affective andn socil(attidude) and knowldge, judgement and thinking(cognitive). But, description on it is so general that superviser in each prefentute and teachers in schools require often more concrete description on it to controll quality of physical education.

To support them to undestand intent of description in the Course Studies, MEXT(2008.2009) publishes also the Guidelines for the Course of Studies. In the Guideline, one can find out example of expected learning outcome in physical education. Description on examples in teaching invasion games in the Guidelines for the reivsed Japanese Course of Study was classified based on-the-ball skills and off-the-ball movements. So their complexity was analyzed in comparison with levels of tactical framework for content for teaching invasion game(Table.2-3).

Table 2. A tactical framework for content for teaching invasion games (Mitchell et al.,2003,p.12)

Table 2. Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

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Table 3. Levels of game complexity for invasion games(Mitchell,et al.,2003,p.13)

Table 3. Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

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RESULTS

In the Guidelines, complexity of tasks in invasion games is shown with 6 stages in every 2 years . In the first stage(1-2 grade), manipulation of ball, finding free space and marking opponents in a simple game are shown. In the 2nd stage(3-4 grade), in the simple modified invasion games, body shape to the goal and moving into space for supporting are shown. In the 3rd stage(5-6 grade), passing to free teammate, keeping ball, shooting after moving into free space and standing between oponent and goal for defense in modified game were shown. In the 4th stage(7-8 gade), using free space in front of the goal, shooting in free space and decision making on passing are shown. In the 5th stage(9-10the grade), making space in front of goal and using it effectively are shown. Moving away from teammates for making space for them and covering space in front of goal are also shown. In the 6th garde(11-12 grade), all examples for invasion game are related with off the ball movement.

Content of games teaching is described with two categories;on-the- ball skills and off-the-ball movements. One can’t find out description on decesion making in games as content. As shown in the intrduction, in the Japanese Course of Study, content are described in three domains;motor, affective and social(attidude) and knowldge, judgement and thinking(cognitive). It is dificulut to teachers to distingish decesion making in performance and decesion making in cognitive domain. So appropriate decesion making in performance is assessed in motor doman.

These 6 stages could be classified again into 3 stages based on 3 developmentary stage in the Course of Study. From 1st to 4th garde, simple on-the ball-skills and finding sape in simple modified games are set as the main tasks. From 5th to 8th garde, on-the-ball skills with appropriate decision making on offense are shown. Fom 9th to 12th, off-the- ball movement in both task(offensive and defensive) in games are shown. Table.4- to 6 show the result based on the categores of Mitchell et.al.(2003,2006). From these tabels, one can point out fuature of content standard as followings;

1) Related with tactical tasks on offense and scoring, off-tha-ball-movements are cleary shown as the important content to be taught in evey stage. In elementary school level, off-the-ball movements to solve the task “using space in attack” are shown. In contrast, task “creating space in attack” are tought as more difficult task for junior and senior high school stundets.

2) Related with defense, one think “defending space” is more difficult task to be achieved. Also in comparison with offensive tasks, defensive tasks are not so strongly emphasized in elementary school. It is rather set as the tasks to be learned in secondary school levels. Also no description on goalkeeper is shown.

3)Restaring play looks like not so important as the tasks to be learned in physical education. Grenally to say, off-the-ball movement is emphasized in the revised Course of Study in comparison with the former Course of Study. Table 4. Examples of content in offense in the revised Course of Study

Table 4. Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

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Table 5. Examples of content in defense in the revised Course of Study

Table 5. Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

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Table 6. Examples of content in restarting play in the revised Course of Study

Table 6. Teaching invasion games in the revised japanese course of studies

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Discussion

Based on the Guideline for the revised Japanese Course of Study, support to recieve the ball in games is the main expected learning outcome in related with off- the-ball movements in offence, but there is no description on adjustment shown in GPAI. After 9th grade, off-the-ball movement to make space for teammate, especially in front of goal is required to learn. In this sense, off-the –ball movements in the revised Course of Study is focused on the support to resieve the ball from teammate. Assessment of complexity of tactical problems in the revised Japanese Course of Study is also a little bit different from the description in Mitchell et al.(2003).

For exampel, guarding and marking is set as the tactical probelems as that of for level 2 in elementary schools and transition is set that for level 3. Similar with Mitchell et al.(2006,pp.29-30), in the lower garde in the revised Japanese Course of Study, focus of tactical problems lies on scoring, not on defense. In the level 2(3-4 grade), it is recomenned to use modified games which make stundents emable to see the value in marking. But, in the revised Japanse Course of Study, one see such taks in the level in 7-8 grade. In thise sense, defenseive tasks are set a littel bit later in the revised Japanese Course of Study. On the other hand, description on the content is not divided claerly into on-the-ball skills and off –the-ball movements.

There is the mixed discription. For example, in the 5-6 grade, as one of the example, “?Moving into space easy to score, receiving the ball and shooting.” is shown. In this example, on-the-ball skills like recieving the ball and shooting is combined with off-the-ball movements like moving into space easy to score. In elementary school level, offensive tasks such as on-the-ball skills and off-the-ball movements like moving into space to shoot are mainly intended to teach. Defensive tasks are set rather in junior or senior schools. Also transition and restarting are shown not so much.

For evaluating complexity of taks in game, complexity of decesion making should be consider. Number of players in the field and time limitation to manipulate balls would be one of the important factor to increse complexity in games. But, on the other hand, there ware many type of rules such as primary rule and secondary rules in games(Siedentop, et al.,2004,p.59). If one change rules in games without considering difference of type of such rules, it would be harder for student to find out tasks in games to achieved and solve problems. So in the revised Japanese Course of Study, modified game such as small sided game and changing rule in game to decrease complexity are recomended, especially games lesson in PE for elementary and juniro high schools.

CONCLUSION

Time allocation for physical education is limited in curriculum. In Japan, PE is provieded usually with 3 time in a week in 45 min. in elementary schools and 50 min. in junior and senior high schools. For making well balanced PE yearly plan, each school should consider the time allocation for each content area. So usally the length of the unit of invasion games would be 6-10 hours in elementary schools, 6-12 hours in junior high schools and 15-20 hours in senior high schools. These conditions are so important to set content standard and perfermance stanadard in schools because expected outcome would be changed based on time condition(French et al.,1996). On the other hand, one should be accoutable to achieve goals in PE.

So one should be carefully in selecting content standard and setting performance standard. But, to set reliabel content standard and performance standard, one should develop appropriate assessment tools and also need to cooperate with schools. Surey, related in assessment tool, there are many ideas in this reserch filed to assess student performance in games(Blomqvist et al.,2005; Gréhaigne et al.,1997; Memmert,et al.,2008;Ogiwara et al.,2010,Onizawa et al.,2007), but enough evidence with such tools are not shown yet.. Pedagogical meaning of games would be realized through appropriate learning process.

To make appropriate learnig process, one should set appropriate performance stanfard in game, but it is hard now to get reliable information on it. In this sense, reliability of these complexity should be cheked in practice. It woul be expected that more apporiate content standard and performance standard in invasion games would be set based on such effort in near furture.