PLAYcoach

What is PLAYcoach?

PLAYcoach is used by coaches, physiotherapists, athletic therapists, exercise professionals and recreation professionals to determine their perception of a child’s level of physical literacy. It includes questions about the child’s ability, confidence, participation and more.

To simplify things, we’ve broken down PLAYcoach into five subsections:

  1. Physical Literacy Visual Analogue Scale (VAS)
  2. Cognitive Domain
  3. Environment
  4. Motor Competence
    • General Motor Competence
    • Balance
    • Object Control
    • Locomotor
  5. Fitness

Who can use PLAYcoach?

PLAYcoach should be filled out by a person with a very good understanding of human movement and with formal movement analysis training. This observation provides one perspective of a child’s level of physical literacy, while the other PLAY Tools each provide a different perspective. This information can help identify positive and negative factors that affect a person’s ability to live a physically active lifestyle.

As a coach, physiotherapist, athletic therapist, exercise professional or recreation professionals: Once you have spent some time with the child (more than four weeks), use PLAYcoach in conjunction with the other PLAY Tools to create a baseline observation of the child’s current level of physical literacy. Use the baseline to create goals and track improvement. You and the child should establish realistic goals (where the child wants to be) and a manageable process to reach them.

As a parent: Ask the coach of your child’s sport program to fill out PLAYcoach if you’re looking for some extra insight into your child’s physical literacy. An NCCP-certified coach will typically be knowledgeable about how your child moves and reacts in different physical activity scenarios, as well as about your child’s current level of physical literacy. Make sure that the coach has spent enough time with your child to provide an adequate observation – typically after about one month of exposure.

Directions

  1. Read through and answer each question with the help of the PLAYcoach workbook.
  2. Use PLAYcoach along with the other PLAY Tools to obtain various perspectives of the child’s level of physical literacy.
  3. Score your form with the help of the PLAYcoach tracking sheet located at the back of the workbook.
  4. Take Action: Review the list of ways to taking action in your PLAYcoach workbook.
  5. Remember to use the PLAYcoach Tool along with the other PLAY Tools to see all perspectives of the child’s level of physical literacy.

Additional Information

Important:

  • Each question refers to your perception of the child.
  • There are no right or wrong answers.
  • There is no need for measuring – simply give your best estimate for each question.
  • If you don’t know, don’t answer.