USING DIGITAL VIDEO GAMES APPROACH TO JUNIOR SPORT

If you're a parent of a child under the age of 18 then you know the addictiveness of video games in all their formats.

On top of that us parents want our kids off video games but what we need to stop and think about even more is why they are so driven to them and as you'll see below, how it can be used in junior sport to create training sessions and maintain participation following a digital video games approach.

I picked this up from Twitter at some point and I'm pretty sure it was a table from a book but I didn't reference it when I put it in my notes so unfortunately I can't tell you where it came from specifically.

PRINCIPLES / CHARACTERISTICS

• What’s the mission?
• No technical or tactical focus
• The emphasise is on players strategising and re-strategising
• The coaching mindset from within the game shifts from "This is what we will be learning today" to "This is today’s mission".

USING THE PAUSE BUTTON

• Integrating varying degrees of support for players via the 4 C’s (cheat/change/clue/challenge)
• Only the players  decide when, how and with what they’d like support via the 4 C’s
• The coaching mindset within the game shifts from "How can I help/Challenge the players" to "How are the players responding to the mission?"

LEVEL UP

• Complexity (variations of time/space) moves from simple to complex levels, where players can be on different levels within the same game
• The initial assessment of players occurs via their meta-cognitive skill
• The coaching mindset from within the game shifts from "What’s my next progression for this practice" to "Who’s likely to level up next?"

EARNING A SUPER POWER

• Providing players with the opportunity to be more effective for a short period of time
• Players decide when and why they need the power and how best to use it
• The coaching mindset within the game shifts from "How do I adjust the task to meet the ability of all players" to "What super power might be helpful for players to earn?"

SAVING PROGRAM

• Individual players/teams can end/re-start the game at different levels and therefore with a challenge point that is relevant to them
• Players are inclined to take risks during the game play because the game won’t allow for regression
• The coaching mindset within the game shifts from "We need to cover all of this technical/tactical content" to "Let’s allow players to spend time mastering this game."

Let me know how you see that this approach could be used to develop your training sessions?