By Phil Kearney
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @kearney_phil
ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3425-663X
Researchgate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Phil_Kearney
Google Scholar profile: https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=ZFggoBgAAAAJ&hl=en
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @kearney_phil
ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3425-663X
Researchgate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Phil_Kearney
Google Scholar profile: https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=ZFggoBgAAAAJ&hl=en
A variety of Games-Based Approaches have been adopted by Irish sports as templates to guide coaches practice; for example, Hockey Ireland promote Play Practice Play, Cycling Ireland promote the 6P Model, and All-Ireland Gaelic Football Championship winning coach Paddy Tally recently espoused the value of Teaching Games for Understanding. In this interview, I speak with Master Adrian Byrne. With a background as both an athlete and a coach, Adrian is the Chair of the International Taekwon-Do Federation Coaches Committee as well as a Coach Education Development Officer for Sport Ireland with a remit spanning multiple sports. We discuss topics such as:
- being inspired by Rod Thorpe’s early work on Teaching Games for Understanding and Game Sense,
- game-based or scenario-based: the importance of finding language that coaches can latch on to,
- how a game-based approach can be applied with both novices and international competitors within a martial art,
- within mixed ability groups, as are common in martial arts, the whole purpose of training is that everybody in the environment gets better from where they are now,
- how a game-based approach can be promoted within an organization from the top down and bottom up.
