Examining the Youth Multi-Sport Event Environment: Implications towards athlete development and transitioning.

Many factors are associated with a person’s attitude formation and intention towards a behavior. In this study, we examined organizational factors that helped form young athletes attitudes regarding their future plans in high performance sport. Through a mixed method survey design, data was collected from 207 young pre-elite athletes who competed during the 2017 Commonwealth Youth Games in Bahamas. Several organizationally controlled aspects of the games environment were found to contribute to young athlete’s satisfaction with the event including their accommodations, available information regarding their sport and finally, the social and cultural activities during games-time. However, satisfaction with the games environment was not predictive of young athletes future intentions to remain in sport. Qualitative thematic coding denoted two key themes related to athlete plans to continue in high performance sport: level of satisfaction and learning. Further, qualitative results revealed five main impediments to continuing in high performance sport specifically, physiological, psychological, performance, environment and life concerns. The paper contributes to our understanding of the controllable and uncontrollable social and environmental factors in a multi-sport international event. Nationally controlled factors that influence young athletes attitude formation, specifically their satisfaction and intentions to remain in sport

Gamification of e-Learning: an investigation into the influence of gamification on student motivation.

Master of Commerce in Information Systems & Technology. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2017.Traditional teacher-centred learning is being confronted by an increasing awareness of the value of student-centred learning. E-learning, despite its limitations, is often presented as a solution to learning challenges prevalent in teacher-centred learning since it affords students greater control of the learning process. Combined with this, academics are increasingly competing for students’ attention and struggle to motivate students. However, students, when confronted with the array of games and social media platforms available, willingly dedicate several hours glued to their screens socialising, engaging and gaming. Such willingness to engage these so-called distractions whilst displaying reluctance to engage their academic work may be attributed to a lack of motivation. This is even more prevalent in the domain of e-learning. Adopting an embedded mixed methods case study design, this study explored the influence of gamification of e-learning on motivation. Herein, expectations and factors influencing experiences of gamification of e-learning were explored. Furthermore, through Self-Determination Theory (SDT) & Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI) as theoretical lenses, this study explored how gamification of e-learning influences motivation. Gamification is conceptualised as an objective-driven user-centred technique which integrates game mechanics, dynamics and game aesthetics into real-world contexts to motivate behaviour. Gartner envisages that by 2020, gamification will be deeply integrated into the prevalent higher education structures. Whilst many applications of gamification aim towards enhancing classroom-based learning, the exploration of gamification of e-learning in higher education, particularly in a developing country, remains an emerging domain of research. This research found that participants experienced gamification and various game elements differently, based on their BrainHex gamer profiles. In terms of SDT, whilst progression through the gamified course was guided and consistent, with all participants progressing as a single group, they experienced a sense of autonomy. Participants also experienced a greater sense of competence and relatedness in engaging with the gamified course. In the context of IMI, participants’ experiences suggest that gamification was valuable, increased curiosity and was effective for learning. However, they reported experiencing tension and a high degree of effort required by the gamified course. Students expected transparency in terms of scoring and raised queries where required. They generally preferred visual cues whilst engaging with the gamified course, expected almost real-time feedback in terms of scoring and resolution of queries, but had varying views on which game elements motivated them. Essentially, it was found that gamification positively influenced participants’ motivation. However, it must be noted that whilst gamification motivated students, some experienced demotivation. Contributing factors include not understanding the game from the outset, being demotivated by not earning frequent rewards and losing progress in the game due to external factors

The Impact of Student-Teacher Interactions on Academic Achievement: A Phenomenological Study Examining the Perceptions of First-Year University Student-Athletes with Online Education

The purpose of this transcendental phenomenological study was to describe the impact of student-faculty interaction and its perceived effects on academic achievement in online education for student-athletes attending a Division I university in Missouri. At this stage in the research, quality of student-faculty interaction in online education is defined as online interaction between teachers and students that leads to better self-directedness, motivation, engagement, student satisfaction, and academic achievement. The theory guiding this study was self-determination theory as it helps to identify and understand the student-athlete’s inherent drive towards action and doing tasks towards growth and proficiency in online education. The central question leading this research study asked, “What are student-athletes’ lived experiences of faculty interactions and academic engagement when learning in an online environment?” The participants selected for this study are male and female, aged 18 to 22, first-year student-athletes enrolled in one or more online courses attending a NCAA Division I University in the state of Missouri. Data was collected and triangulated through surveys, individual interviews, and journal prompts. All collected data was analyzed using the transcendental framework. To present the essence of the phenomenon, data analysis followed Moustakas\u27 (1994) transcendental methods of epoché, phenomenological reduction, and horizontalization of textural and structural descriptions. The study produced three themes and eight sub-themes. The themes were course dynamic, student-instructor involvement, and quality of student-instructor interactions. This study found that quality student-faculty relationships impacted their perceptions of self-directedness, motivation, engagement, student satisfaction, and academic achievement

Playing class: a case study of ludic pedagogy

The purpose of this study was to examine the efficacy of transforming traditional classroom content and teaching strategy into a gamified version through the use of popular gaming strategy, or, in other words, how a college course can be designed or redesigned to mimic ludic pedagogy, as well as the influence of this pedagogy on student performance in understanding course content and course assessments. The researcher acted as a participant observer and used Constant Comparative Method as data driven teaching focused on student created documents. This research provides an exploration on the use of ludicly styled teaching methodology which includes students as instructors, the instructor as a “game master,” and the impact of Achievments on student performance in an introductory Education survey course. Findings suggest that pre-service teachers of the Millennial generation may flourish in a gamified environment and need to engage in and experiment with using new styles of pedagogy in order to be prepared to teach their future Generation 2020 students

Dual Career of High-Performance Student Athletes in China (mainland): A Comparative Study Based on the Analysis of Partial Chinese national and Provincial Teams

With the goal to highlight itself on international sports forums, most countries attached tremendous attention to competitive sports. The elite athletes, therefore, are forced to dedicate themselves more and more to achieve excellence in their athletic careers (Dawn Aquilina, 2013). In this case, much less time is left for them to develop other aspects outside of their sporting career. However, as a whole person, elite athletes should consider their post-athletic life. This drives them to develop their dual career. Aiming to develop China into a powerful sporting nation from the current major sporting nation, Chinese sports authorities have made great efforts in competitive sports, including investing the modern facilities, inviting foreign coaches, improving the welfare of athletes and providing more opportunities to receive higher education. To ensure the conduct, Chinese sports bodies, and educational authorities formulated a lot of policies. Nevertheless, there still exist some deficiencies. Within this study, a large number of participants involving 24 Olympic sports including 33 disciplines were surveyed, which was documented firstly in Chinese HPSA literature. This study made a contribution to the policy-maker of high-level stakeholders, in addition to providing necessities to the DC pathway of HPSA. This dissertation was developed to explore the dual career of Chinese student-athletes in mainland China by means of conducting an open-ended questionnaire towards partially elite student-athletes from national teams and provincial teams. In order to provide a whole picture of the dual career of Chinese student-athletes, this research adopted quantitative descriptive research based on three theoretical frameworks. In addition, European and American dual career policies were also discussed to compare with Chinese policies. The objectives of this dissertation were: 1) to explore the performance of Chinese High-Educational Institutions and sports authorities on facilitating college degree accomplishment towards student-athletes; 2) to examine the referenceable availability of European and American policies of high-performance student-athletes for Chinese authorities; 3) to identify the performance of high-performance student-athletes in their High-Educational Institutions context. All in all, the core objective was to address the central question: How is the development of the dual career of high-performance student-athletes in China? This research employed psychosocial, developmental, and economic frameworks to examine the development of DC of Chinese HPSA and their self-perception of the implementation of DC strategies of Chinese educational organizations and athletic authorities. 1) Holistic athletic career model was adopted to evaluate DC policies on the different development stages of elite athletes, among which both normative and nonnormative transitions of them were concerned. Meanwhile, the transitions arising at the athletic level, psychological level, psychosocial level, and academic/vocational level were also involved. 2) Human capital theory as an interdisciplinary approach was applied in this research to reveal the practice conducted in Chinese HEIs and sports bodies. 3) Resilience theory was introduced to appraise SA¿s performance in front of adversity. 4) In order to further explore the DC policies that prevailed in different countries, this research also expounded on the relationship between sports models and the social system. The radical differences between socialism and capitalism lead to different pursuits in their sports model. Nevertheless, no matter what sport model, it is much related to politics. As for the methodology, this doctoral thesis adopted a quantitative research approach. It was used to identify problems with current practices in the dual career of Chinese student-athletes, justify the current practices of Chinese sports and educational authorities, make judgments, or determine what all stakeholders should do in similar situations. Therefore, 1) A web-based questionnaire containing 79 items was used to collect data; 2) Participants (n=675, Mage =21.3 ) who take part in 21 Olympic sports and some other non-Olympic sports were involved; 3) The questionnaire was designed and analyzed from three aspects, including sports career, academic career, and tutoring service. Regarding the results, four conclusions were drawn: 1) Time constraints taking up a major barrier, which is consistent with historical literature that revealed time constraints served as a crucial challenge involving balancing academic performance and athletic achievement; 2) China has provided modern, cozy and convenient training facilities for student-athletes, but training service was underdeveloped, including the coaches, psychology, etc.; 3) Most Chinese universities have employed modern and athlete-friendly teaching methods, while some higher-educational institutions provided biased academic context, including limited majors, lacking specific tutor service, etc.; 4) Further enhancing self-resilience beliefs was necessary for student-athletes to improve their capability to cope with not only adversities faced in sports but outside of sports.Actividad Física y Deport

Rethinking gamification

Gamification marks a major change to everyday life. It describes the permeation of economic, political, and social contexts by game-elements such as awards, rule structures, and interfaces that are inspired by video games. Sometimes the term is reduced to the implementation of points, badges, and leaderboards as incentives and motivations to be productive. Sometimes it is envisioned as a universal remedy to deeply transform society toward more humane and playful ends. Despite its use by corporations to manage brand communities and personnel, however, gamification is more than just a marketing buzzword. States are beginning to use it as a new tool for governing populations more effectively. It promises to fix what is wrong with reality by making every single one of us fitter, happier, and healthier. Indeed, it seems like all of society is up for being transformed into one massive game.The contributions in this book offer a candid assessment of the gamification hype. They trace back the historical roots of the phenomenon and explore novel design practices and methods. They critically discuss its social implications and even present artistic tactics for resistance. It is time to rethink gamification