Sport Development and Coaching BA (Hons)

Teaching and Learning

The University places emphasis on enabling students to develop the independent learning capabilities that will equip you for lifelong learning and future employment, as well as academic achievement. A mixture of independent study, teaching and academic support through the personal academic tutoring system enables you to reflect on progress and build up a profile of skills, achievements and experiences that will enable you to flourish and be successful.

Teaching

You are taught through a combination of interactive lectures, seminars and coaching practicals. Interactive workshops take a variety of formats and are intended to enable the application of learning through discussion and small group activities. Seminars enable the discussion and development of understanding of topics covered in lectures, and coaching practicals are focused on developing subject specific skills and applied individual and group project work. You will apply appropriate sport development, coaching and management models and practices to a range of theoretical and real life situations, in order to make appropriate operational and strategic decisions. You will explore the working environment that sport development officers find themselves in, and understand the complex partnerships and interactions which create threats and opportunities for sport programmes and initiatives.

In addition, meetings with personal academic tutors are scheduled on at least 4 occasions in the first year and three occasions in each of the other years of a course.

You have an opportunity to complete two Level 2 equivalent coaching courses in Sprt1024, and to undertake a 40 hour coaching or development placement in the third year of the course, with agreed projects supervised by a work-based mentor and a University tutor. You are also required to complete a year long Independent Study or Sport Development project in the third year of the course, supervised by a University tutor.

Contact time

In a typical week you will have around 12 - 16 contact hours of teaching. The precise contact hours will depend on the optional modules selected and in the final year you will normally have slightly less contact time in order to do more independent study and undertake the work based placement.

Typically class contact time will be structured around:

• 9 hours of interactive sessions
• 2 hours of (large group) lectures
• 1-2 hours of seminars in groups of around 10-20 students
• 3 hours of coaching practicals

Independent self-study

In addition to the contact time, you are expected to undertake around 24-28 hours of personal self-study per week. Typically, this will involve completing online activities, reading journal articles and books, working on individual and group projects, undertaking research in the library and online, preparing coursework assignments and presentations, and preparing for examinations.

Independent learning is supported by a range of excellent learning facilities, including the Hive and library resources, the virtual learning environment, and extensive electronic learning resources.

Teaching staff

You will be taught by a teaching team whose expertise and knowledge are closely matched to the content of the modules on the course. Teaching is informed by the research, and the team includes senior academics, and professional practitioners with industry experience. The majority have a higher education teaching qualification or are Fellows of the Higher Education Academy. You can learn more about the staff by visiting our staff profiles.

Assessment

The course provides opportunities to test understanding and learning informally through the completion of practice or 'formative' assignments. Each module has one or more formal or 'summative' assessments which are graded and count towards the overall module grade.

Assessment methods include written examinations and a range of coursework assessments such as essays, reports, portfolios, posters, coaching delivery, presentations and a final year independent study or sport development project.

The precise assessment requirements for an individual student in an academic year will vary according to the mandatory and optional modules taken, but a typical formal summative assessment pattern for each year of the course is:

Year 1

• 1 formal examination of 2 hours duration
• 6 essays
• 2-3 practical reports
• 2-3 individual or group presentations

Year 2

• 1 formal examination of 2 hours duration and 1 in-class test (2 hours)
• 4 essays
• 2-3 practical reports
• 1 poster, grant form and crowdfunding platform design submission
• 1-2 individual or group presentations

Year 3

• Major independent study or sport development project of approx. 8-10,000 words
• 1 reflective and skills portfolio relating to work placement
• 2-3 essays
• 2-3 practical reports or seminar delivery
• 1 poster
• 1-2 individual or group presentations.

Feedback

You will receive feedback on practice assessments and on formal assessments undertaken by coursework. Feedback on examination performance is available upon request from the module leader. Feedback is intended to support learning and you are encouraged to discuss it with personal academic tutors and module tutors as appropriate.

We aim to provide you with feedback on formal course work assessments within 20 working days of hand-in.