Carl Thomas Woods

This chapter examines the central role of the environment in shaping the journey towards physical literacy, emphasising the dynamic interplay between individuals and their surroundings. It challenges reductionist perspectives that isolate physical, cognitive, emotional, and perceptual domains, instead framing physical literacy as an embedded phenomenon arising from person–environment relations. Drawing on an ecological dynamics perspective, the chapter explores how enriched and enabling environments foster exploration, adaptability, and the self-organisation of functional movement solutions. Throughout, we explore the essential role the environment plays in shaping our physical literacy journey. More specifically, ‘physical literacy’ – as considered in this chapter – resides beyond the biological boundaries of the human body, being shaped by a ceaseless interplay between environmental information and the intrinsic dynamics of an individual. It is through movement experiences shaped by the environment and the various tasks one engages with that functional movement solutions emerge, with concomitant adaptations throughout the whole system. These adaptations occur across multiple nested scales, which, we suggest, are advantageous in supporting people on their journey to lead physically literate and active lives.

What defines a coach's journey? Is it the local, national or global level they reach, and/or the subsequent tournaments they win? Is it one of potential fulfilment – matching their position against pre-determined benchmarks? Or is it the experiences undergone along the way, overflowing into what is yet to come? Not a connected series of progressive steps mapped in advance, but a continual ebb and flow, the definition of which, remains beyond the horizon? Our aim, here, is to advocate for the latter. Drawing on Tim Ingold's concept of wayfaring, we suggest that a coach's journey is not one of ‘being’ but becoming ; not a nominal sequence that closes in vertically, but a dynamic, cascading process that opens out (a)longitudinally. The implications of this conceptualisation are explored across three components of wayfaring: i) on knowing, ii) on attending, iii) on carrying on. To animate each, we share the biographical reflections of an international Rugby Union coach whose career stretches more than three decades. In sharing these reflections, our hope is to show that a coach's journey need not be defined by the levels reached or tournaments won, but the definition of which continually unfolds through experiences undergone along the way.

Background: In the sport sciences, skill development is often (implicitly) explained through two metatheoretical perspectives: interactionism and transactionism. Given certain assumptions, the former adheres to a linear pedagogical approach to learning, while the latter follows a nonlinear pedagogical approach. The aim of this systematic review was to compare the effects of linear and nonlinear pedagogical approaches on the development of technical and tactical skills in team-invasion ball sports. Methods: A systematic search of six databases (EmBase, PubMed, SPORTDiscus, OVID Medline, CINAHL, and OVID PsychInfo) was undertaken from root to 1st May 2024. Included studies were critically appraised using the ROBINS-I and RoB2 instruments. A narrative and descriptive synthesis approach was utilised. Results: From 7450 potential records, nine studies were included, which explored the effects of a nonlinear versus linear pedagogy for developing technical and tactical skills in team-invasion ball sports. While, for most outcomes, the results showed there were no significant differences, nonlinear pedagogy did appear more favourable in 34% of technical outcomes. Further, descriptive synthesis of four studies revealed that nonlinear pedagogy was significantly better for developing tactical skills in 66% of outcomes. Conclusions: While based on limited studies, linear and nonlinear pedagogical approaches appear to achieve similar results with regards to technical skill development. However, nonlinear pedagogy was favoured in some studies. With regards to tactical skill development, nonlinear pedagogical approaches appear better than linear approaches. Further high-quality research is needed to confirm these findings and examine how they may be implicated by the representativeness of the assessment instruments. Key Points: Both linear and nonlinear pedagogical approaches assist with skill development in team-invasion ball sports. Nonlinear pedagogical approaches generally result in greater effects when developing tactical skills, while most literature shows there are no significant differences between approaches when developing technical skills. Further high-quality research exploring the effects of these pedagogical approaches is required to substantiate these findings. Questions remain regarding the representativeness of the assessment instruments used in the studies included in this review. Registration: This systematic review is registered with Open Science Framework- https://osf.io/za247/

In a recent issue of Psychological Research, Bock, O., Huang, J-Y., Onur, O. A., & Memmert, D. (2024). The structure of cognitive strategies for wayfinding decisions. Psychological Research Psychologische Forschung, 88, 476–486. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-023-01863-3.) investigated cognitive strategies purported to guide wayfinding decisions at intersections. Following experimentation in a virtualised maze, it was concluded that intersectional wayfinding decisions were based on a ‘generalized cognitive process’, in addition to ‘strategy-specific’ processes. The aim of our comment is not to challenge these findings or their methodological rigour. Rather, we note how the study of human wayfinding has been undertaken from entirely different metatheoretical perspectives in psychological science. Leaning on the seminal work of James Gibson and Harry Heft, we consider wayfinding as a continuous, integrated perception-action process, distributed across the entire organism-environment system. Such a systems-oriented, ecological approach to wayfinding remediates the organismic asymmetry pervasive to extant theories of human behaviours, foregrounding the possibility for empirical investigation that takes seriously the socio-cultural contexts in which inhabitants dwell.