GAME SENSE APPROACH

IN PDHPE
 WHAT IS GAME SENSE?

Game sense approach was first introduced by a duo named Bunker & Thorpe (1982). It
was a way of introducing a game by teaching people the technical aspects of a game
rather than a game as a whole. The idea of game sense approach is to create situations
for the player or student where they have to use skills such as problem solving and
tactics to succeed.
Depending on which country you live in, there are different variations to what
Australians call game sense. For Example in Europe it is called the Tactical Decision
Learning Model, Americans call it the Tactical Games Approach and in Singapore they
call it the Games Concept Approach (Butler, Oslin, Mitchell and Griffin, 2008). No matter
where this is taught, it is based on the same principals as Australia.
The game sense approach is generally based around four categories which are target,
striking/fielding, net/wall and invasion. This basically covers all the fundamentals
needed to play any sort of game/sport.
 FUNDAMENTAL MOVEMENT SKILLS

An important aspect needed to be taken into consideration is the fact that students need to
posses fundamental movement skills. Having fundamental movement skills is valuable for a
student to have because it encourages an active lifestyle (Clarke, Barnes, Holton, Summers
& Stratton, 2016).
According to Clarke et al. (2016), Fundamental movement skills are considered the basic
building blocks for movement and provide the foundation for specialized and sport-specific
movement skills required for participation in a variety of physical activities (page. 261).
Gallahue & Ozmun (2006) state that there are three types of categories that fundamental
movements skills are based on. These categories are; locomotor skills which is the
movement from one place to another such as running, hopping and jumping, object-control
skills which is when you can do skills involving a ball such as throwing, catching and kicking
and the last category is stability skills such as being able to balance.
 IMPORTANCE OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION
Being involved with any type of physical education whether it is through sport or just
playing in the playground is a great way for children to boost their physical, social,
cognitive and psychological development (Janssen & Leblanc, 2010). According to
Morrow, Tucker, Jackson, Martin, Greenleaf & Petrie (2013) there more children are
involved with physical activity, the better chance they have of having good cardio
fitness and muscular strength whilst also reducing the amount of body fat. Furthermore,
it can also have a positive impact on their social life because according to studies, it
shows that being physically active reduces factors such as depression and improves
(Janssen and Leblanc, 2010).
Overall, it is the teachers duty of care to try and come up with lessons that are as
creative as possible while incorporating fundamental movement skills. Instead of
focusing on a single sport over a set of weeks such as soccer, the teacher can put their
focus on the skills leading up to the sport to get each child ready such as stopping the
ball, kicking the ball and using strategic tactics. This will get the students to learn the
basic skills involved before playing the actual version of the game/sport.
 LINKS TO SYLLABUS

The NSW PDHPE syllabus tries to focus on the main skills needed for PE whilst balancing
the health aspect of the unit. The game sense approach and fundamental movement
skills comes under the two outcomes labelled Moving Skills and Games and Sports
Knowledge & Understanding (NSW PDHPE Syllabus, 2014).
Year 3 and 4 is generally when invasion games such as netball and soccer are
introduced. This is a good stage to introduce this because invasion games can
sometimes be hard to comprehend for the younger years.
Whereas year 5 and 6 is when they focus on modified versions of games such as oz-tag
and diamond cricket. Because they are at a later stage of development, at this stage
the students should know the basics of kicking, running, hitting and catching. It is also
easier to get them to play these games rather than the earlier stages because they
have a better understanding of the instructions being told.
 STRENGTHS AS A TEACHING APPROACH
The positives outweigh the negatives when it comes to using game sense approach in a
PE lesson. The main strength being that it allows students to really focus on their problem
solving skills and strategic tactics to beat the opposition. While using the game sense
approach, it allows students to focus on their fundamental movement skills as well, so
they are learning to basic fundamentals before jumping into the actual sport/game.
Another strength is that it gets students more actively involved, especially those who tend
not to participate. This encourages students to have an active lifestyle which can also lead
into an easier transition when they reach high school because the students have not
missed out on any skills.
The great thing about breaking down a sport, is that it allows the teacher to approach the
lessons in a different and creative way which can cater for all the students skill level and
needs. It also creates more options for the teacher in terms of what the lesson is based on,
for example a lesson on throwing and catching. Furthermore, these types of lessons are
usually smoother to run as you are focusing on one or two skills only rather than playing a
sport which may not get all the students participating.
 STRENGTHS AS A TEACHING APPROACH

Using the game sense approach also allows to include a majority of this skills
that are involved in the syllabus in a shorter time period. In other words, a
teacher can focus on skills over a couple of weeks rather than learning a single
sport over the same amount of time which allows more of the syllabus
outcomes to be completed. Focusing on skills can cover more sports. For
example, kicking covers soccer, rugby and AFL.
Finally, another strength is that teachers can focus on a whole category such
as invasion games and target games. So when planning lessons, the teacher
can use whole categories to plan a unit. It does not matter what year or stage
the teacher has, if they analyse a game sense approach to their PE lessons it
can really help them plan lessons and meeting the unit outcomes.
 REFERENCES

Board of Studies. (2006). Personal Development, Health and Physical Education (PDHPE) Years K6 Syllabus.
Sydney: Board of Studies
Bunker, D. & Thorpe, R. (1982). A model for the teaching of games in secondary schools. Bulletin of Physical
Education, 18(1), 5-8.
Butler, J., Oslin, J., Mitchell, S., & Griffin, L. (2008). The way forward for TGfU: filling the chasm between theory
and practice. Physical and Health Education Journal, 74(1), 6-12.
Clark, C. C. T., Barnes, C. M., Holton, M. D., Summers, H. D. & Stratton, G. 2016. Profiling movement quality and
gait characteristics according to bodymass index in children (911 y). Human Movement Science, 49,
291-300.
Gallahue, D. L. & Ozmun, J. C. 2006. Understanding motor development: infants, children, adolescents, adults. ,
Boston; United States, McGraw-Hill.
Janssen, I. & Leblanc, A. G. 2010. Systematic review of the health benefits of physical activity and fitness in
school-aged children and youth. Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act, 7, 40.
Morrow, J. R., Jr., Tucker, J. S., Jackson, A. W., Martin, S. B., Greenleaf, C. A. & Petrie, T. A. 2013. Meeting physical
activity guidelines and health-related fitness in youth. Am J Prev Med, 44, 439-44.