SSPEL Newsletter: Research and Scholarly Activities

I presented at the Active Devon Conference at Exeter University on October 14th. The conference attracts coaches working across Devon. I presented two sessions during the day on Hydration, Dehydration and Hyponatraemia. The sessions were designed to raise coaches' awareness of this potentially fatal condition.

Erica Eaton-Quinn

Raising attainment in the Physical Education 14-19 curriculum

Friday 19^th October

The PASH day is a whole city closure day where a range of continued professional development conferences and held for all secondary teachers. In all there are 17 secondary schools in Plymouth and 6 special schools.

The Physical Education day was coordinated by myself in my role as lead tutor and operations manager for Plymouth and Torbay Local Delivery Agency. Representatives from Plymouth’s sports partnerships, sports colleges and Plymouth Local Authority worked together to put together a programme based upon audited need across the city.

Just under 100 Physical Education teachers met for the day’s conference hosted by Sir John Hunt Community College. The day consisted of nine workshop options, where delegates choose three. The workshops are outlined in the table below.

Time	Session	Activity 1	Activity 2	Activity 3
8am	Registration / refreshments / Market place – The Hall
8.25 – 9.45	1	Workshop 1: Using Dartfish to support analysis of performance and synoptic assessment (Practical)	Workshop 2: Looking forward changes to the 14- 19 curriculum	Workshop 3: Sports Education – a curriculum model for 14-19 age group
9.50 – 10.10	Break / Breakfast / Market place – The Hall
10.15 – 11.35	2	Workshop 4: Developing Health related exercise units for KS 4 - In line with new curriculum (Practical)	Workshop 5: Raising standards in PE and the New Curriculum KS 3 and KS4 planning	Workshop 6: Interactive learning for GCSE and A Level (including interactive whiteboard)
11.40 – 1.00	3	Workshop 7: OCR – subject specific workshop to include Nationals	Workshop 8: Long Term athlete Development - Its compatibility with the new national curriculum	Workshop 9: Raising standards in PE and the New Curriculum KS 3 and KS4 planning

A range of tutors were involved in delivering the workshops, including Stella Turner, consultant on 14-19 developments for the OCR, Brian Coates educational consultant and course leader for Southampton University PGCE PE, Jackie Arthur and Erica Eaton-Quinn from Marjon, Steve Jones subject specific consultant for national qualifications in sport from OCR, Chris Mather, Stuart Taylor and Kelvin Kirk from Marjon as well as myself and Ian Luke.

The day was not only an opportunity for teachers across the city to be engaged in relevant CPD, but also for them to reflect on current practice, share experience, practice and policy and network with other organisations. Evaluations showed the day to be very valuable, well organised and with huge potential impact on practice. A range of follow up CPD opportunities are to be developed to support teachers in school further.

Gill Golder

Woodside conference Centre

Warwickshire

Wednesday 10^th – Friday 12^th October 2007

The PE ITTE Network began life as the HEI/Schools Network, aiming to bring together HEI providers of PE ITTE and their school-based partners to discuss and agree action on related issues. As ITTE provision has been widened, so the Network has expanded to the point where it now encompasses all providers of PE ITTE, be they Secondary or Primary, HEI-based or school-based.

The focus for this year’s conference was ‘Sustaining High Quality Physical Education Initial Teacher Training’ over the course of the three days a number of workshops, discussion forums and seminars were held to enable all present to contribute to the development of consistent high quality PE ITTE, address issues and concerns raised by providers of PE ITTE and Ofsted inspection reports related to PE ITTE, and share best practice.

The conference started with an address by Margaret Talbot (Chief Executive of the Association for Physical Education) who identified successes and challenges facing PE ITTE – one issue raised was that of Primary PE provision in ITTE. During discussion that followed Marjon was used to exemplify good practice through creative module development to increase PE time (the primary B.Ed route having a half module with PE and citizenship), also the development of relevant undergraduate degrees routes preparing students for either a PGCE or GTP route into teaching (Coaching and Physical Education and the new Children’s Physical Education). Sue Campbell of Youth Sports Trust followed putting Physical Education into the bigger picture. Marjon again got a mention in the discussion with the Hub Club that was successfully launched with the visit of Seb Coe. Finally Judith Rundell (Chief HMI for Physical Education) gave an overview of characteristics for high quality PE both at school phases and ITTE. Judith headed up the team inspecting Marjon when we received out 1 for M and QA last year. She used examples of best practice from both the PGCE and B.Ed at Marjon to illustrate her talk.

Day two focused on two key themes, firstly, selection, recruitment and retention especially with widening participation and encouragement of BME students into teacher education – this is a national problem in Physical Education, a number of presentations were given that shared research findings with the group followed by workshop activities aimed at exploring strategies that could be adopted to link both to the ‘aim higher’ and the widening participation agenda. The second focus was led by Andy Frapwell (Regional co-ordinator, coordinator for PE dissemination of the new curriculum and Marjon external examiner) and addressed the new secondary curriculum now finalised and in secondary schools for planning and piloting and then to be taught to year 7 in September 2008. Small group discussions aimed at sharing best practice as to how a) HEIs were supporting schools in the planning process, b) how ITTE providers were training mentors to support trainees in schools and c) how ITTE providers were developing modules and content to meet the requirements of the new secondary curriculum. In all areas Marjon were able to provide clear examples of how mentor training has been developed, module outcomes adjusted and the new curriculum addressed through both permeation and focused elements and how, through the LDA, a programme of support for schools has been planned. The day concluded with the launch of a CD rom resource ‘Entering New Worlds’, developed by Andy Frapwell, the resource supports ITTE and teacher training in and through PE and was developed using staff expertise and trainees from Marjon.

Gill Golder

23rd October 2007, Sandy Park, Exeter

Sam Peach and Aaron Beacom attended this conference which was essentially about disseminating the 2012 Olympic legacy plans. The conference aim was to share how the Government, LSC and other agencies are using the Games to inspire young people, improve education and increase sports and community engagement across the region. The conference was organised and hosted by the Learning Skills Council in partnership with Team South West (SWRDA).

Keynote speakers were:

Lynda Lawrence (Dept. Children, Schools and Families 2012 Co-ordinator) who spoke about the Dept.’s plans to secure education legacy of the 2012 Games and LOCOG plans on education.

Steve Dowson (Dept. Innovation, Universities and Skills 2012 Co-ordinator) who discussed his department’s plans to maximise the skills benefits of hosting the 2012 Games.

Gareth Smith (Deputy Head, Podium) whose presentation title was “Putting Education and Skills at the heart of 2012)

Guy Lavender (SW Director for 2012) who spoke about what was happening in the SW.

Paul Pettigrew (LSC 2012 Director) who discussed the education and skills legacy for the SW.

Each of these presentations will be made available on the SWRDA and LSC websites (www.southwestrda.org.uk)

The key things to emerge from the conference were:

• There are a large number of organizations and agencies involved in developing plans. It is therefore difficult to get a clear understanding of the overarching strategy – plans seemed to lack clear direction and substance at this stage.

• There is no additional funding available to develop this legacy. Speakers referred to the need to “Olympify” existing activities and projects.

• Government agencies are relying on a bottom up approach – ie for schools, Colleges, Universities and other organizations to implement projects linked to the Olympics in order to create this legacy. There appears to be a very optimistic view of what can be achieved socially, culturally, economically etc. through the staging of the Olympic Games: a presentation of the Games as having the potential to cure all ills - including health objectives relating to obesity. At the same time there appears to be few substantive initiatives concerning how objectives can be realised. Instead it is a case of saying to the regions 'its up to you - Olympify, Olympify'.

• There was certainly tension reflected in comments made by both Lavender and Pettigrew, concerning strategy for recruiting and up-skilling volunteers - both indicating that at present the focus was on London wide as opposed to country wide benefits and that they were not willing to accept this.

• Important organisations that were referred to in the conference, that people may not have heard of and might be worth referring to; 'Office of the Third Sector' (sits within the Cabinet office and deals with the important area of co-ordinating efforts to encourage volunteering).'Olympic Executive' (A governmental committee that reports to the Secretary of State for the DCMS and has a cross-governmental role with particular involvement in the legacy agenda).

• Some useful documents were referred to which colleagues may find useful:

DCMS 2012 Legacy document: “Our promise for 2012” – available to download from DCMS.

To be published early December (approx 6th Dec):
LOCOG education plan
Mori Survey Findings (on 5-19 year olds views/ understanding of the Olympics)
Legacy Action Plan for 2012

There were one or two ideas that emerged that may be of value for us as a School/ College to follow up on and consider:
• Advanced Apprenticeships (linked to Olympic Sports)
• Using the Games to attract International Students
• Curriculum developments – e.g. a module on the Olympics / international sports studies degree etc
• Volunteering opportunities
• Pre-Olympic Training camps for some of the smaller nations

Sam Peach / Aaron Beacom

Towards the end of a highly successful collaborative project to establish a multi-sports hub club at the College, Chris Mather is now writing up his report for Sport England. The scheme has attracted much attention, including a visit from Lord Coe.

Jackie Arthur has successfully completed the first year of a part-time masters, focusing on mentoring within ITT and she is now embarked on a second year focusing on provision for effective inclusion.

Erica Eaton-Quinn and Jackie also just attended The Big Food Debate in Liverpool where the state of the nation's eating habits were explored by a variety of public and private service providers.