How did I learn all this stuff?': The socialisation of coaching knowledge and learning practices within a sub elite coaching population

Coach education in its entirety has been identified as a key vehicle for raising the standard of coaching practice and that of which creates a good coach. In saying this, existing literature (Barker-Ruchti et al., 2016; Cushion et al., 2010; Hodkinson et al., 2008; Gheradi, 2008; Corsby, 2017; Gilbert and Trudel, 2005) highlights that formalised coach education has offered little value to the growth, learning and development of coaching practitioners. The basis of knowledge that coaches are given creates a mould that shapes the ‘type’ of coach that fits into a sporting setting where said knowledge can be transferred into a foretold environment (Fyall et al., 2018; Nash et al., 2017; Fernandez-Balboa, 1997; Howley & Howley, 1995). The difficulty in this is that coaches are at risk of being rendered as unskilled in the socio-dynamic environment that houses them (Fyall et al., 2018; Nash et al., 2017). Thus, in evaluating the learning process and accumulated knowledge of sub-elite coaches, light can be shed how coaches have come to know what they know, do as they do and how this process can best be facilitated. Using the work of Pierre Bourdieu, this thesis attempts to interpret the accumulation of knowledge and the learning therein through the notions of habitus, capital and field (Bourdieu, 1984; 1977). Through constructivist grounded theory analysis, the purpose of this study is to empirically explore the learning culture in and around coach education and the transferability of said learning into contextual, day to day practice. Through ethnographic observation, the data captured will draw on personal, historical and current dispositions that determine coaches as characters of knowledge (Cushion et al., 2003; Jones et al., 2008).

Grantor dc:publisher

Oxford Brookes University

Year dc:date

2020

Author dc:creator

• Dorrell, Laura

Contributors dc:contributor

• Phelan, Simon
• Jakeman, John

Statement dc:rights

• All rights reserved

Language dc:language

en

DOI dc:identifier

https://doi.org/10.24384/dh5y-vp91

OAI identifier oai:identifier

tle:a7d95bcd-5764-438b-a259-a179a95fd93f:d6bd9758-527a-46cd-bfe2-c433766e8fca:1