KPE well represented in new sport coaching book

Image of coach talking to young soccer players by Adria Crehuet Cano on Unsplash
11/08/2020

A recently published book on coaching brought together 10 contributors from the University of Toronto's Faculty of Kinesiology and Physical Education, including past and present varsity coaches, instructors and students from the Faculty.

david cooper
David Cooper, on the far right in the back row, with the 2014-15 Varsity Blues women's squash team (photo by Jill Clark)

The book, called Tactical Decision-Making in Sport: How Coaches Can Help Athletes to Make Better In-Game Decisions, was co-written and co-edited by David Cooper, an associate professor, teaching stream emerita from KPE, and Barrie Gordon, associate professor in health and physical education at the Victoria University of Wellington, and focuses on how coaches can help their athletes make better in-game tactical decisions. The first part of the book discusses theories and strategies behind decision-making while the second part draws on the practical knowledge of experienced international coaches in a range of sports who describe how they go about helping their athletes become better decision-makers.

The book is written from an Athlete Centred Coaching (ACC) perspective using Game Centered Approaches (GCA) focussing on the Developing Thinking Players (DTP) model as the vehicle for achieving this goal. In these teaching, coaching and learning approaches, the student and athlete are the focus of these strategies. The book provides sport-specific instructions for coaching players in territory games, net games, striking games, target games, racquet games and combat sports, including soccer, netball, basketball, ice hockey, cricket, softball, football, rugby, volleyball, squash and karate.

There are contributors from universities in the USA, New Zealand, England, and a senior high-performance coaching consultant with the Coaching Association of Canada. Former and current KPE students, lecturers, instructors, coaches and professors have all written at least one chapter in the book:

BPHE, Exercise Science MSc and PhD alum, former course instructor and soccer assistant coach, the late Dr. Guido Geisler (1976-2018); 
BPHE, Exercise Science MSc alum, former KPE course instructor, lecturer, Varsity Blues women’s squash assistant coach and student athlete, Karlene Headley-Cooper;
Exercise Science MSc alum and current PhD student, Kaleigh Ferdinand Pennock;
Current mentor in the Masters of Professional Kinesiology program, Tom Williams;
Current course instructor, Nathalie Williams;
Former Varsity Blues men’s hockey head coach and current senior athletic instructor, Darren Lowe;
Current Varsity Blues men’s basketball head coach, John Campbell;
Current Varsity Blues men’s volleyball head coach, John Barrett;
Former Varsity Blues men’s football head coach, Greg Gary;
Associate Professor, teaching stream Emerita and former Varsity Blues women’s squash head coach, Dave Cooper

“I am really proud of the book and that it contains 10 chapters written by people who have or had a really strong connection and commitment to our Faculty,” says Cooper. “It demonstrates the wealth of knowledge and talent that we have in KPE.”