PhD, Associate Professor T.G. Kotova¹
PhD, Associate Professor S.V. Dmitrieva^1
1Tyumen State University, Tyumen

Keywords: interest in vocational career, education process differentiation, personal motor experience, modular education curriculum, typical errors in martial arts techniques.

Background. The radical ongoing reforms in the social, economic and political systems in Russia for the last decades need to be supported by the relevant transformations in the key elements of the national academic education system. In the pedagogical education reform process, new professional standards for an education service specialist and advanced adult/ children education specialist have been implemented with the relevant requirements to professional and personality competences of the specialists. The academic Physical Education discipline is in high priority in the modern bachelor training system designed to train a highly competent specialist having due motivations for professional career [5]. These competences imply, among other things, that the sport education specialist must by highly proficient in teaching children, adolescents and adults and be capable of taking a right decision in any situation. Thus the physical education and sports specialist must demonstrate high and stable professional motivations and be highly knowledgeable and skilful in a variety of sports, including modern martial arts.

Objective of the study was to explore the ways to encourage vocational interests and motivations in Physical Culture University students majoring in Martial Arts.

The new physical education and sports specialist training course under the academic bachelor training curriculum is geared to develop due determination and self-reliance in students and encourage their motivations for professional careers by the education curriculum being duly differentiated.

The educational process differentiation means herein the process being customised to every group of the students as dictated by their individual traits and background motor experience, with the educational system being individualised on the run for every such group.

Personal motor experience (PME) means herein the practical individual accomplishment in the physical education and sport activity including acquired knowledgebase, skills, abilities and physical qualities plus individual attitudes to self-perfection-driven physical activity [3].

Based on the I.V. Manzheley’s classification, we offer the following types of differentiation applicable in different physical education models: selective differentiation applicable in the knowledge building education component that, as far as the physical education domain in concerned, may be described as the conditioning model driven by external-to-internal development concept; selectively elective differentiation designed on the ‘external design of internal process’ concept; elective differentiation that means the personality-focused process designed on the ‘external via internal’ concept; and the electively selective differentiation that implies the self-reliant and competency-focused education model driven by the ‘internal to external’ concept [4].

Methods and structure of the study. The educational experiment was performed at Physical Culture University. Subject to the experiment were 146 first-year full-time students (97 males and 49 females) of Physical Culture University majoring in Martial Arts. For the purposes of the study we grouped the sample based on the V.S. Farfel’s sport movement classification [6]: Group 1 for cyclic sports; Group 2 for acyclic sports; Group 3 including situational sports split up into the Group 3A team sports; and Group 3B martial arts. The academic Martial Arts curriculum was revised to encourage the professional motivations and interests building agenda and give new materials systematised by the key didactic modules: core physical qualities development module; martial arts technique and tactics mastering module focused on the universal motor actions; and competitive and refereeing practice module. Each of the modules included the following blocks: entry tests; theoretical block; and practical (methods, practices, education and training, self-reliant training and progress test) block. The martial art techniques were build up with account of the PME and based on the action guiding frame (AGF) and the key reference points (KRG) being specified, with the training process supported by analyses of the motor skills by the trainees on their own.

Study results and discussion. Prior to the educational experiment, the above groups were tested with insufficient (40% to 67%) professional career motivations and ‘average’ physical education and sporting needs, motivations and practical activities; with the general and special physical qualities tested as ‘high’ and ‘average’, respectively; and motor skills tested on the whole as ‘satisfactory’ and ‘unsatisfactory’.

The academic progress tests revealed the following data:

– Still insufficient coordination and speed-strength abilities and endurance and flexibility rates that are of detrimental effect on the standing throws and ground moves and combinations;

– Typical errors in the martial arts techniques including: situational body control errors; poor control of move direction, pace and amplitude; low speed of moves; inadequate body balance ability; disproportional muscular efforts; disharmonised footwork and handwork; stiffness of trunk control and footwork; unnecessary movements in motor skills.

The students’ interest in the vocational field was encouraged by the following means: due motivations for determined activity and academic progress facilitation [1]; and moderation method. The process moderation in Group 1 was focused on group trainings; in Group 2 on small group and couple trainings; in Group 3A on leader-changing group trainings; and in Group 3B onleader-assisted group training and probative assistant trainer roles. The moderation method was applied in the group trainings after each student acquired basic standing throw and ground fighting skills and implied the following succession: information sharing, with the communication process efficiency secured by due feedback and interpersonal inter- and intra-group contacts and discussions plus student-trainer communication; training material visualising tools to facilitate due understanding and clarity with an option of turning back to the necessary knowledge/ skill to compare it with the new one; situation playback to support the motor skill mastering process with due creativity in the individual and team work, self-learning and peer-learning process; progress tests that implied the process success rating at every stage of the educational process versus the prior stage and versus the expected result; reflexion at the end of each training session to digest and systematise the new knowledge and skills, analyse the progress, rate own performance, own role and contribution in the teamwork, and correct the performance when necessary. Educational process individualisation was largely based on constructive interaction and dialogue with trainer, student and team acting as contributors to and co-operators for success [5].

Progress in physical qualities was secured by the following group training methods: in Group 1 these were interval-repetitive, varied-interval, game, circuit, and Crossfit trainings; in Group 2 - varied-interval, interval-repetitive, game, circuit, and Crossfit trainings; in Group 3A it - varied-interval, interval-repetitive, game, circuit, competitive and the Crossfit trainings; and in Group 3B - circular, competitive and Crossfit trainings [2].

In the martial arts technique mastering component, the following verbal and demonstration training tools were applied: in Group 1 - explanations, analyses, error-corrections, trainer’s demos, comparison and video replays; in Group 2 - explanations, peer-analyses in couples, trainer’s demos, comparison and video replays; in Group 3A - commentaries, ratings, self-ratings, trainer’s (or skilled master’s) demos, comparison and video replays; and in Group 3B - instructions, video replays and peer demos.

Sets of exercises were formed with due consideration for the sport specifics including imitative, preparatory, combined and ideomotor exercises designed with a special emphasis on the typical error correction and physical progress facilitating aspects. The group trainings were basically different in the goal-setting and achievement aspects, with a special priority to the move difficulty levels, learning process pace and progress, required repetitions, work-and-rest regimen etc. The students mastered the standing throw techniques and ground moves and combinations, with a focus on action guiding frames (AGF) and key reference points (KRP) being specified in the training logbooks for each mastered motor skill (MS). The motor skills mastering sequences in the standing and ground fighting components were designed for each technique and for the process on the whole by the following tools: video demos of the subject move; trainer’s or peer’s demos; ideomotor exercises; imitative exercises with/without strength-building tools like rubber cords; MS mastering in couples; preparatory exercises; special physical exercises for deficient physical qualities; and special analysis of the most difficult motor skills. This training system made a special emphasis on the trainees’ motivations both for vocational martial arts and professional career on the whole to help them consolidate the knowledge and skills and accumulate good motor experience, necessary competences for teamwork, cooperative culture, creative thinking and joint-decision-making ability.

Conclusion. The post-experimental tests showed the following group-wise progress in the professional interest and motivations building domain: stable progress in 20% to 66% [of the group totals]; unevenly stable progress in 23% to 54%; and unstable progress in 10% to 40%; that means that the average progress of 15-30% was achieved. We also found ‘above the average’ progress of 13.8% to 31% in the students’ physical education and sporting needs, motivations and actual practices. We believe that the progress in the interest in and motivations for professional career was due to the prudently selected education tools designed to build up the knowledgebase, skills and motor experience in the future physical education and sports specialists, with a special emphasis on the AGF aspect. The physical fitness rates were tested to significantly grow, with 25% to 60% [of the group totals] tested with progress in standing throws and ground moves and combinations.

References

1. Bogdanova V.A. Interes kak veduschiy motiv [Interest as a key motive]. Mater. 2-y mezhdunar. nauch.-prakt. konf. ‘Fizicheskaya kultura i sport: integratsiya nauki i praktiki’ [Proc. 2nd Intern. res.-practical conf. ‘Physical culture and sport: the integration of science and practice’], Stavropol, 2005, pp. 22-25.
2. Kolunin E.T. Fizicheskaya podgotovka sportivnogo rezerva v komandnykh igrovykh vidakh sporta na osnove konvergirovaniya sredstv gimnastiki [Sport reserve physical training in team game sports based on converted gymnastic practices]. Teoriya i praktika fiz. kultury, 2016, no. 12, pp. 62-64.
3. Kotova T.G. Differentsiatsiya obucheniya sportivnykh pedagogov po distsipline «Edinoborstva» [Sport educator's training process differentiation in martial arts]. Teoriya i praktika fiz. kultury, 2016, no. 12, pp. 12-14.
4. Manzheley I.V. Differentsiatsiya v razlichnykh modelyakh fizicheskogo vospitaniya [Differentiation in various models of physical education]. Fizicheskaya kultura: vospitanie, obrazovanie, trenirovka, 2015, no. 5, pp. 5-8.
5. Manzheley I.V., Simonova E.A. Fizicheskaya kultura: kompetentnostny podkhod [Physical education: competency building approach]. Moscow-Berlin: Direct Media publ., 2015, 183 p.
6. Farfel V.S. Klassifikatsiya dvizheniy v sporte [Classification of movements in sports]. Teoriya i praktika fiz. kultury, 1970, no. 11, pp. 4-7.

Corresponding author: tatyna2205@mail.ru

Abstract

The study analyses the ways to encourage vocational interest in physical culture university students majoring in Martial Arts, with a special priority given to: educational process differentiation options; interests in teaching career; physical education and sporting needs, motivations and determinations; and individual motor experiences. The study offers a classified modular education material with a special emphasis on the typical technical errors in the modern competitive martial arts and special practices to correct them. Subject to the study were 146 first-year students of Physical Culture University majoring in Martial Arts. Their interest in the vocational field was encouraged by the following means: due motivations for determined activity in the sector; academic progress facilitating tools; and moderation method.

The new Martial Arts curriculum was designed to include a few systematized key didactic modules, with the group education curricula being updated in the academic education process. By the end of the pilot education course most of the students were tested with sustainable high interest in the vocational careers; with the overall physical working capacity tested to stay at the same high level; special physical qualities tested to significantly improve; and special physical skills tested to grow as well.