Pete Sturgess: the power of play is disregarded at your peril…

Another intriguing podcast from ECB Coach Development, this time with Pete Sturgess, formerly National Lead for the Foundation Phase with the FA.

I first encountered Pete’s philosophy of coaching more than 10 years ago when I took a level 1 football coaching qualification, and was immediately enthused by his commitment to the importance of learning through play, especially (though not exclusively) for children.

And in this conversation, with Tim Dellor, he explores his approach to coaching, session planning and learning through playing.

In truth, the podcast title undersells the message, of learning design, including play, and of the coach’s role in releasing potential, not “imposing skill”.

So many of Pete’s ideas resonated with me:

• debunking the myth that games-based learning is somehow unstructured and simple, and comprises no more than “just letting the kids play games”;
• the importance of learning design in games-based learning;
• the use of the “instant replay” (a.k.a. the “reset button”) to allow players to actively learn from a mistake;
• the importance of allowing children (all players) the space to learn how to learn for themselves.

Good coaching, in fact!

What is ECB Coach Development doing to recognise the power of play?

Lots of supportive comments from podcast host Tim Dellor (also a long-time ECB Coach Developer).

But what does ECB Coach Development tell new Foundation (level 1) coaches?

• Gain confidence to use icoachcricket

For National Programmes Activators?

• Player centred coaching = identifying what the players can’t yet do and focusing on remedying the deficits… that’s with 5 year olds at All Stars…

Where is the joy in that? Where is the learning? The learning design?

ECB Coach Development have advertised for someone to fast track ex-pros into professional coaching positions by “recognising their experience” (of playing).

Do they also need someone to talk to Pete Sturgess, or the good people at Play Their Way, about child learning, and learning design?

Because without explicit buy-in from the top (Pete mentions the encouragement he received from Dan Ashworth, then the FA’s Technical Director, recently re-joining as “Chief Football Officer” — seemingly a “C-level” appointment), any cricket coach advocating anything so radical as child- and games-based coaching will be ploughing a pretty lonely furrow.