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University of Bedfordshire
Park Square
Luton
Bedfordshire
UK, LU1 3JU

Sophy Bassett

Position

Senior Lecturer in Physical Education

Sophy Bassett

Profile

I achieved my lifelong ambition to become a teacher of Physical Education when I graduated from Chelsea School of Human Movement, Eastbourne, with a B Ed (Hons) degree in Physical Education and Geography (second subject).

My first teaching post took me back to my beloved home town of Reading in Berkshire, where I taught Physical Education and Geography for two years at St Joseph’s Convent School. From there, I moved to the post of Head of Girls PE and eventually Head of Department at Denbigh High School in Luton.

During this time, I was a mentor to student PE teachers from The University of Bedfordshire and from the Chiltern Training Group SCITT scheme. I became the subject co-ordinator in PE for the Chiltern Training Group, working alongside a dedicated team of experienced teachers to build up what was, at the time, one of the newest providers of school centred initial teacher training in the country.

Having had so many positive experiences teaching in secondary education and supporting and developing young and motivated students to become quality teachers, I decided to pursue this aspect of my work. I joined The University of Bedfordshire (then De Montfort University) in 2002 as a Senior Lecturer in Physical Education. This also allowed me to pursue further study and I graduated with a Masters Degree in Education.

My practical experiences in sport have helped me immensely in my career. I have always been a firm believer in the saying, ‘it is not the winning, but the taking part which is important’, and having worked with pupils of all abilities, from all sorts of cultures and backgrounds, the expectation that everyone should be supported to participate to the best of their ability still holds true.

I have been given many opportunities to participate in sport and have achieved success in Tennis at club and county level. I currently play for Bedfordshire and captain one of the ladies ‘vets’ teams.

I have played Basketball up to national level and have been a county player and England trialist at Netball. Tennis and motorsport are my most successful activities at the moment.

I autotest in an MG Midget and have been successful in becoming the first woman to win the John Thornley Trophy for autotesting and the first person to win it 7 times. I have also been part of a three person team to win both the California Cup and the BMC Trophy at Silverstone.

Teaching Expertise

My teaching role is quite varied, delivering theoretical and practical aspects on both the BA QTS PE degree and the PGCE PE course. I am the admissions tutor for the BA QTS degree and Games leader, co-ordinating the practical games aspects of the course. This has been a particularly interesting role, as the team of lecturers and I explore and implement varied and alternative ways of teaching students to help pupils learn via different classifications of games.

I also lead the Year 1 Foundations for Learning and Teaching, the Year 2 Teaching for Learning module and the Year 4 Major Games module.

I spend a large amount of time visiting student teachers in their school placements. This is a very interesting part of my role, as I get to see the students applying the skills and knowledge they have developed during their work at University, as well as keeping in touch with colleagues in school.

I believe it is vital to constantly adjust and update my knowledge of the areas in which I teach. In both my practical and theoretical lectures and seminars, my aim is to engage and involve my audience in a respectful and supportive environment, where discussion, exploration and student centred learning is the intention. I would hope that this would then motivate the students to ensure that their pupils they teach receive the same.

Research Interests

Through playing tennis, I continue to research both technique and strategy in order to facilitate the skill development of the students and consequently improve their confidence to teach Tennis via pupil centred approaches. There is a distinct shortage of supporting materials for teachers of Tennis as opposed to coaches of Tennis and I have been working with the LTA to develop their Secondary Teacher resources which are now available on the LTA Schools Tennis website.

Currently, my research focuses on both practical and theoretical aspects of teaching. My practical teaching has also allowed me to pursue the philosophy of Physical Literacy and along with two colleagues; I have researched and written a paper for the Physical Literacy conference (2011) on learning to teach pre-service teachers through Physical Literacy.

I am also working as part of a team led by Sue Capel, researching student lesson planning.

As part of my MA, my dissertation researched the approaches that year 2 PE students used during school experience when teaching Tennis, and the extent to which they applied a range of Mosston and Ashworth’s teaching styles A – E. A number of issues were raised from this which I would like to research in greater depth, including the relative inexperience and consequent lack of confidence of students to advance/diversify their teaching approaches in order to engage their pupils via the generic principles of net and wall games.

Contact Details

T: 01234 793421
E: sophy.bassett@beds.ac.uk

Bedfordshire University

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