Associate Professor, PhD L.A. Parfenova¹
Postgraduate G.B. Glazkova¹
PhD E.V. Makarova^2
1Volga Region State Academy of Physical Culture, Sport and Tourism, Kazan
²Ulyanovsk State Agricultural Academy n.a. P.A. Stolypin, Ulyanovsk

Keywords: school children with medical issues, physical education, education model, competency building approach, physical education competences.

Background. School period is a key stage in a child's life that plays a major role in the personality mental and physical development; however, this stage is associated with certain risks that may, if not duly countered, be of damage for the natural process of the adolescent body adaptation to an educational process and even result in health disorders that are now diagnosed in 20-40% of the school population in fact [2, 3]. This is the reason why a high priority is given by the modern educational system – in response to the broad public demand – to the initiatives to improve the body abilities to adapt to the modern educational process; cultivate due values-and-senses-focused goals in the health improvement process; and build up due competencies in the physical culture and health improvement domain [1, 4, 5]. These objectives may be attained if the relevant research and education methods are mobilized with the relevant educational process modelling tools being applied.

Objective of the study was to provide theoretical substantiations for the physical education model for the school children with medical issues, based on a competency building approach.

Methods and structure of the study. The physical education process model was designed to include the following: objective; core idea; goals and concepts making it possible to identify specific aspects (on an innovative basis) of the physical education model for secondary school children with medical issues; an experimental program with the relevant institutional and educational provisions for its implementation; and expected benefits.

The model objective was to optimize the physical education process in application to the secondary school children with medical issues based on a competency-building approach viewed as a core idea of the physical education process model focused on the educational success, i.e. due physical education competences and children’s health improvement. Furthermore, common didactic principles of general education (conscious attitude and activation principle; accessibility and individualization principle; and clearness principle) plus the integration principle (that implies all components of the educational process being logically agreed and thereby determines the educational methods, forms and means) were used as the key concepts of our model. Special emphasis in the new model was made on the integration principle in the following aspects: integration of the academic and off-class educational process forms; integration of the project activity and self-reliant work of the students; and focus on the inter-subject links in the theoretical and practical education material being learned by the students.

Content-setting and procedural part of the new model spells out the institutional and educational provisions for the physical education model implementation plus the experimental program that accumulates and integrates the innovative content of the physical education process focused on the physical education competency building in the school children with health issues.

The above new program was designed based on the valid FSES requirements with due consideration for the interests and preferences of the school children in the physical culture domain and includes the following sections: explanatory note (spelling out the program objective, goals, concepts and structure); intellectual and cognitive section with the key theoretical material to build up the sufficient knowledge base; instructions and procedures designed to form due skills and abilities; the motor activity section including the health improvement and corrective exercises, ankles-developing, respiratory gymnastics and physical training components; the special training section including health improvement races, Russian lapta games and competitive (adaptive) volleyball games; pupils' self-reliant activity; and the criteria-setting and progress-rating section.

The base component of the program (60-70%) is designed as required by the relevant federal education standards for the school physical education curricula with due adjustments for the pupils with health issues. The variable program component (30-40%) offers the attractive motor activity tools and elements applicable with allowance for the special physical needs, body functionalities, physical fitness and medical and educational indications for physical education practices of the subject category.

The institutional and educational provisions for the model include a variety of the following special educational tools and system elements: unconventional approach to the physical education process planning and structure; motivations-sensitive health improvement training methods; integrative development of cognitive and motor qualities; strengthening and activating inter-subject links; applying the problem-focused game method; applying health-improvement-focused project designs and activities; identifying and excluding the contraindicated/ non-physiological motor actions/ exercises from the class practices; medical and educational control and self-control in the process.

In the new physical education process model design we were driven by the health improvement training concepts that are largely based on the biological, educational and psycho-physiological development logics. It was the game format that was applied as a leading method of the health improvement training in the process, with an emphasis on volleyball, Russian lapta, competitions in these sports, and health improvement race competitions – for the reason that any game activity is known to be based on a systemic activation (competency-building) approach.

Study results and discussion. The experimental implementation of the above institutional and educational provisions helped build up the following physical education competencies in the pupils: general cultural competencies including comprehensive knowledge of the origins, history and modern progress of vocational sports; social and labour competences including special knowledge, skills and practices in applying the relevant sport facilities and equipment for physical training; communicative competences that imply teamwork, team decision-making, conflicts-free interaction skills and abilities and due respect to an opponent; learning and cognitive competences including practical experience in applying the relevant technical and tactical tools in a variety of game situations, basic instruction and methodological skills in applying different physical exercises, and due physical training process design and management skills; values-and-senses-focused competences that imply the emotional attachment to the vocational sport disciplines with the growing interest to and motivations for the physical training process; personal excellence competences that imply the instruction and methodological experience in the individualized physical training process design and management in health-sensitive formats.

Practical efficiency of the above physical education model for the subject category of school children was verified by the experimental program with 90 pupils involved and split up into Study Group (n=45) and Reference Group (n=45). The RG pupils were trained under the traditional physical education program for the age group, while the SG students were subject to the experimental program.

The new physical education model showed significant positive effect on the physical progress of the SG students, their physical fitness rates and physical education competency building progress as verified by the positive variation trends of the relevant performance rates in the SG versus the RG. The experimental program resulted in 9 pupils (20.0%) of the SG being qualified for the preparatory health group and 6 pupils (13.3%) – for the main health group.

Conclusion. Successful piloting of the newly proposed physical education model based on the competency building approach in every structural component of the modelled process – including the values-and-senses-, content-and-practice-, criteria setting- and progress-rating- components – makes it possible to effectively build up due physical education competences in pupils and cultivate habitual application of physical practices in life with due motivations and need for a healthy lifestyle and health improvement activity being developed.

References

1. Parfenova L.A. Organizatsionno-soderzhatel'nye aspekty fizicheskogo vospitaniya uchashchikhsya srednego shkol'nogo vozrasta, imeyushchikh otkloneniya v sostoyanii zdorov'ya (Organizational and substantial aspects of physical education of secondary school children with medical issues) / L.A. Parfenova, G.B. Glazkova, S.N. Klyuchnikova // Pedagogiko-psikhologicheskie i mediko-biologicheskie problemy fizicheskoy kul'tury i sporta. – 2012. – V. 25. – # 4. – P. 116-124.
2. Parfenova L.A. O fizkul'turnom obrazovanii uchashchikhsya, otnesennykh po sostoyaniyu zdorov'ya k spetsial'noy meditsinskoy gruppe (Physical education of pupils attributed to special health group based on health) / I.N. Timoshina, I.M. Kuptsov, L.A. Parfenova // Adaptivnaya fizicheskaya kul'tura. – 2006. – # 2. – P. 22-24.
3. Parfenova L.A. Soderzhanie i organizatsiya fizicheskogo vospitaniya mladshikh shkolknikov spetsialknoy meditsinskoy gruppy: avtoref. dis. … kand. ped. nauk (Content and organization of physical education of primary pupils of special health group: abstract of PhD thesis) / L.A. Parfenova. – Nab. Chelny, 2009. – 24 p.
4. Parfenova L.A. Formirovanie fizkul'turno-ozdorovitel'noy motivatsii u shkol'nikov s otkloneniyami v sostoyanii zdorov'ya na osnove kompetentnostnogo podkhoda (Formation of health and fitness motivation in pupils with medical issues based on competency building approach) / L.A. Parfenova, G.B. Glazkova // Nauka i sport: sovremennye tendentsii. – 2016. – # 1. P. 55-63.
5. Parfenova L.A. Napravlennost' i rezultativnost' kompetentnostnogo podkhoda v fizicheskom vospitanii shkol'nikov s otkloneniyami v sostoyanii zdorov'ya (Trend and efficiency of competency building approach in physical education of pupils with medical issues) / L.A. Parfenova, G.B. Glazkova. // Teoriya i praktika fiz. kultury. – 2016. – # 2. – P. 54-58.
6. Khutorskoy A.V. Klyuchevye kompetentsii kak komponent lichnostno-orientirovannoy paradigmy obrazovaniya (Key competences as a component of personality-oriented paradigm of education) / Doklady 4-y Vseros. distantsionnoy avgustovskoy pedagogicheskoy konferentsii «Obnovlenie rossiyskoy shkoly» (Reports of the 4th All-Russian distance August pedagogical conference "Russian school modernization") (August 26 - September 10 2002). – http:// www.eidos.ru/conf/

Corresponding author: laraparf@mail.ru

Abstract

Modern physical education systems give a top priority to new values-and-senses-driven goals in the health agenda and competency building policies in the physical culture and health improvement domains. The article outlines the content of a new competency building physical education model in application to secondary school children with medical issues, with a special emphasis on the institutional and educational provisions for the process and the experimental education curriculum.