PhD, Associate Professor Т.N. Shutova¹
Dr.Hab., Professor L.B. Andryushchenko^1
1Plekhanov Russian University of Economics, Moscow

Keywords: digital services, mobile application, education, science, university physical education and sports, educational establishments.

Background. Presently the national government takes efforts to implement the National Program ‘Digital Economy of the Russian Federation’ (2018-2024) that supports, among other things, new educational service improvement initiatives, models and priorities [4]. The efforts to advance the digitalization projects need to be focused on the challenges and prospects of every specific sector including science, education, and physical education and sports service [4-6, 8] so that to establish the new physical education and sports knowledge industry, expand the relevant software platforms, communication and data processing toolkits, offer new physical activation models for students with efficient physical progress testing, analyzing and data processing tools. As things now stand, 85% of student communities habitually mine information in the Internet; albeit the applicable data processing, prioritization and categorization tools need to be advanced to improve the grassroots innovative activity in the physical education and sports service sector.

Objective of the study was to analyze progress of the university physical education and sports digitalization efforts with a special emphasis on the personality progress, physical activation, fitness and individual health agenda related aspects.

Methods and structure of the study. The study was designed to analyze, among other things, benefits of the university physical education and sports service digitalizing process in the socialization, teamwork, communication, physical activation and sports club domains – with support from a questionnaire survey of the university physical education and sports experts and students with psychological and educational priorities.

Results and discussion. The university physical education and sports service digitalizing projects are presently supported by Universarium Digital Platform with its curricula tested by a few universities, successful fitness companies and business trainers. Thus Stepik Platform offers a wide range of educational courses including six physical education courses tested by a few educational establishments. Udemy Service System offers a range of health and fitness courses with the relevant diet, meditation and Pilates exercises, training models etc., including specific physical education courses recommended by a few educational establishments. We would also mention Lektorium, Eliademy and Eduardo.studio service systems. It should be emphasized, however, that the users are still in need of a comprehensive theoretically grounded search engine for the physical-education-and-sports-related digital platforms, online courses, mobile application, databases and software tools. The digitalization project entities are still not knowledgeable and skillful enough in the data screening, processing, presentation, physical progress test and analysis tools that may be digitalized for electronic applications. As things now stand, the national universities have made progress only in the digital educational environment establishment aspects including the electronic documents, student/ teacher personal accounts, electronic logbooks, manuals and textbooks.

Digital technologies applicable in the university physical education and sports service include Sport 3.0 and Sport 4.0 systems by Aksenov M.O. [1]; Polar system; Excel toolkit; Garmin Connect system; My Fitness Pal Service Platform; Bioimpedance Test system; Garmin-based personal offices of athletes; Esteck Test System [7]; and Omega-sport system.

A.A. Drobyshevsky (2013) offers electronic lecture notes, control test forms, multilevel training quasi-professional tasks, self-reliant progress tests and individual pages on the university department website to effectively digitalize the learning process. Modern computer technologies make it possible to monitor progress in the self-reliant trainings and effectively process, analyze and store the physical education and sports progress test data [2]. It should be mentioned that the physical-education-and-sports-specific digital services and mobile application are lately growing very fast year to year [3]. The popular Health and Fitness mobile application may be classified as follows: see Figure 1 hereunder.

Figure 1. Classified popular Health and Fitness mobile application

The popular Health and Fitness mobile applications are generally classified into diets, jogging and walking, training systems and physical progress tests [3]. The Diets mobile applications include the calorie intake calculators (YAZIO, Lifesum, Fat Secret); protein, fat and carbohydrate (PFC) and water demand trackers ("My Water", Waterbalance, Aqualert). In addition, Diets offer ready-made meals, restaurant menus with calorific values, with foods- and dish-specific counters.

The Physical Progress Test Systems include 1) blood pressure tests ("Cardio", MedM); 2) sleep control: Sleep Cycle, Goodmorning, Sleep Better; 3) pedometers: Health, Moves, Runtastic, Accupedo, Stepz; and the popular detailed jogging/ walking: Endomondo Sports Tracker, Nike Run Club, Cardio Trainer (see Figure 1). The trainer mobile applications include 1) weight loss systems; 2) power trainers; and 3) yoga. Weight Loss Applications: # BS365, My Weight Loss Trainer, Weight Loss Fitness; and power trainers Workout Trainer, daily training.

Furthermore, we run a questionnaire survey of the physical education and sports experts (n=173) to analyze challenges for the university physical education and sports service digitalization initiatives, with the sample including 48.7% of non-sports university experts; 35.8% elite athletes; 14.1% secondary vocational education service experts; and 7.6% of the fitness, mass sports and children's sports experts. The sample ranked the top digitalization problems as follows: Excel files processing issues (19.6%); and digital reporting issues (17.5%). It should be noted that 79% of the sample reportedly use the Internet search engines although only 3.8% of the teachers keep their own online courses or have an online education service certificate. 32% of the sample reported the need for an IT skills advancement course; 68% was found innocent in the university physical education and sports service digitalization matters; and 60% of trainers reported a critical need for modern data mining, processing and storing tools.

Having analyzed the university digital physical education and sports courses, we found shortages of professional and theoretically grounded data, with many educational establishments only learning the ropes of modern digital education service having little if any knowledge of the digitalization process benefits, content and goals. At the same time, students were found to highly appreciate the available online courses. Thus the Stepik Fitness physical education service course offered since June 2019 reports 1156 trainees, 128 positive comments and is ranked 4.8 points high on a 5-point scale. The course persistently improves the independent/ distance work tools, expands the theoretical database, creates individualized physical education service models, offers fast progress test tools, facilitates social networking of the students and teachers, sharing of practical experience, search for innovations; and feedbacks from students.

Conclusion. The study demonstrated the need for the physical education and sports specialist training in modern digital physical education and sports service issues to equip them with the modern IT/ digital services knowledge and skills. The ongoing university physical education and sports service digitalization initiatives shall facilitate the practical and theoretical physical education and sports service methods by innovative and efficient data mining, processing, categorizing, analyzing and applying tools.

References

1. Aksenov M.O. Management of powerlifting training process based on modern information technologies. Abstract of PhD diss.. Ulan-Ude, 2006. 24 p.
2. Drobyshevskiy A.A. Organization of students' independent work using computer-based learning technologies. Abstract of PhD diss.. Saratov, 2013. 23 p.
3. Shutova T.N., Zasinets K.D. Mobile applications for monitoring of diet and exercise: classification approach. Actual problems of sports science in aspect of social and humanitarian knowledge. Scientific symposium dedicated to the memory of V.K. Bal’sevich. 2019. pp. 119-124.
4. Yudina T.N., Tushkanov I.M. Digital economy through the prism of economic philosophy and political economy. Filosofiya khozyaystva, 2017. No. 1. https://cyberleninka.ru/article/n/tsifrovizatsiya-kak-tendentsiya-sovrem...
5. Andryushchenko L.B.,Filimonova, S.I.,Aksenov, M.O., Pushkina, V.N.(2019). Physical education service at university of economics: Mission and progress policies. Teoriya i Praktika Fizicheskoy Kultury. No 9. рр. 9-11.
6. Filimonova S.I.,Andryushchenko, L.B.,Averyasova, Y.O.,Filimonova, Y.B. (2018). Self-fulfillment agendas to improve national physical education and sports management system. Teoriya i Praktika Fizicheskoy Kultury. No 9. рр. 103-104.
7. Shutova T.N. (2017). Modeling of fitness technologies in the process of physical education of students on the basis of diagnostics "Esteck system complex". Teoriya i Praktika Fizicheskoy Kultury. No 9. pp. 30-32.
8. Shutova T.N. (2016). Fitness and computer technology in university physical training optimization. Teoriya i Praktika Fizicheskoy Kultury. No 3. рр. 101.

Corresponding author: tany-156@rambler.ru

Abstract

Objective of the study was to analyze progress of the university physical education and sports digitalization efforts with a special emphasis on the personality progress, physical activation, fitness and individual health agenda related aspects.

Methods and structure of the study. The study was designed to analyze, among other things, benefits of the university physical education and sports service digitalizing process in the socialization, teamwork, communication, physical activation and sports club domains – with support from a questionnaire survey of the university physical education and sports experts and students with psychological and educational priorities.

Results of the study and conclusions. 32% of physical education and sports experts emphasized the need to improve their professional IT skills, while 68% of respondents did not understand the process of digitalization of general education and physical education and sports educational process in particular. At the same time, 60% of coaches were at the critical level in the use of modern data collection techniques, information processing and storing technologies. 79% of the sample reportedly use the Internet search engines although only 3.8% of the teachers keep their own online courses or have an online education service certificate. 32% of the sample reported the need for an IT skills advancement course; 68% was found innocent in the university physical education and sports service digitalization matters; and 60% of trainers reported a critical need for modern data mining, processing and storing tools.

The study demonstrated the need for the physical education and sports specialist training in modern digital physical education and sports service issues to equip them with the modern IT/ digital services knowledge and skills.