Not quite so fast: effect of training at 90% sprint speed on maximal and repeated-sprint ability in soccer players

Abstract

The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of training at an intensity eliciting 90% of maximal sprinting speed on maximal and repeated-sprint performance in soccer. It was hypothesised that sprint training at 90% of maximal velocity would improve soccer-related sprinting. Twenty-two junior club-level male and female soccer players (age 17 ± 1 year, body mass 64 ± 8 kg, body height 174 ± 8 cm) completed an intervention study where the training group (TG) replaced one of their weekly soccer training sessions with a repeated-sprint training session performed at 90% of maximal sprint speed, while the control group (CG) completed regular soccer training according to their teams’ original training plans. Countermovement jump, 12 × 20-m repeated-sprint, VO_2max and the Yo-Yo Intermittent Recovery Level 1 test were performed prior to and after a 9-week intervention period. No significant between-group differences were observed for any of the performance indices and effect magnitudes were trivial or small. Before rejecting the hypothesis, we recommend that future studies should perform intervention programmes with either stronger stimulus or at other times during the season where total training load is reduced.     

Peer Tutoring: An Aid to Individual Instruction

In this article, the author describes a personal teaching experience that led her to incorporate improvisational drama into her English classroom. The author describes justifications for implementing drama into the classroom as well as the possible benefits gained by teachers and students. Also included are several improvisational dramatic activities and instructions for incorporating them into the English curriculum. Using drama helped to develop confidence, community, and content knowledge in the middle school classroom.     

The 'Conveyor Belt Effect': A re-assessment of the impact of National Targets for Lifelong Learning

Although the National Targets for Education and Training in England and Wales include indicators for lifelong learning, and the progress towards the targets set for these indicators has been lauded by politicians and other observers, much of this apparent progress is actually accounted for by changes in these same indicators at Foundation level. However, once the 'conveyor belt effect', of passing increasingly qualified 16-18 year-olds into the working-age population instead of less qualified 60 and 65 year-olds, is taken into account, then progress in qualifying those of working-age is much less. In fact, there is then very limited evidence that Lifelong Learning targets have had any impact at all. Certainly work-based training has not increased, and may even have declined over the last decade, while some socio-economic inequalities in adult participation in education and training have worsened. The paper examines this apparent weakness for the current approach and its implications for the measurement of progress, in the light of a research review carried out for the National Assembly of Wales. It therefore asks increasingly important questions about targets, such as what they are for, and whether those who set and monitor them are aware of their deficiencies and artificialities.     

Diversity,specialisation and equity in education

School diversity in the UK is not a new phenomenon. However, recent reforms to ‘modernise’ the secondary school system towards greater diversity of provision, primarily in England, needs to be explored in more detail. The article begins by proposing three phases in the development of state‐funded school diversity and provision between 1944 and 1997. It then goes on to consider such reforms with the introduction of a Labour government in 1997. We argue that school diversity under New Labour represents a distinct fourth phase within this broad policy agenda. While there is some continuity in the expansion of school diversity this most recent phase is characterised by greater governmental intervention and a stronger commitment to provide greater resources for schools in disadvantaged communities. However, the paper then critically analyses the relationship between recent programmes of education diversity and equity. In particular, we go on to discuss the extent to which critics’ fears about the emergence of a two‐tier system are justified. We conclude that while the fourth phase in the UK school diversity agenda may aim to be more equitable, complementary and collaborative it perhaps fails to recognise that the education system today is more competitive and consumer‐led.     

Students' experiences of aggressive behaviour and bully/victim problems in Irish schools

Since the 1980s, a greater understanding of the frequency and typology of bullying/victim problems in schools has been accrued in many countries, including Ireland, where a nationwide study of bullying behaviour in schools was undertaken in 1993–1994. However, rather less is known about Irish school students' involvement in other forms of aggressive behaviour. The purpose of the survey described here was to ascertain the prevalence of school students' experiences of certain categories of general aggressive behaviour, as well as the prevalence of bully/victim problems, in Irish schools. Data were obtained via the administration of a specially and extensively modified version of the Olweus Bully/Victim Questionnaire to 5569 participants (2312 primary and 3257 post-primary) in Ireland in the autumn/winter school term of 2004–2005. Principally, it was found that experiences of aggressive behaviour appeared to be widespread; whilst age trends varied according to individual categories of aggressive behaviour, gender differences were more clear – boys were more frequently the targets of ‘direct’ forms of aggressive behaviour, whereas girls were more frequently the targets of ‘indirect’ forms. Furthermore, bully/victim problems appear to be persistent in Irish schools, with 35.3% of primary students and 36.4% of post-primary students reporting having been bullied over the last three months. It was contended that inroads into preventing and dealing with bullying and aggressive behaviour in Irish schools might best be made via governmentally-supported nationwide intervention programmes, as has been the case in Norway.     

A written language intervention for at-risk second grade students: a randomized controlled trial of the process assessment of the learner lesson plans in a tier 2 response-to-intervention (RtI) model

In a randomized controlled trial, 205 students were followed from grades 1 to 3 with a focus on changes in their writing trajectories following an evidence-based intervention during the spring of second grade. Students were identified as being at-risk (n?=?138), and then randomized into treatment (n?=?68) versus business-as-usual conditions (n?=?70). A typical group also was included (n?=?67). The writing intervention comprised Lesson Sets 4 and 7 from the Process Assessment of the Learner (PAL), and was conducted via small groups (three to six students) twice a week for 12 weeks in accordance with a response-to-intervention Tier 2 model. The primary outcome was the Wechsler Individual Achievement Test-II Written Expression Scale. Results indicated modest support for the PAL lesson plans, with an accelerated rate of growth in writing skills following treatment. There were no significant moderator effects, although there was evidence that the most globally impaired students demonstrated a more rapid rate of growth following treatment. These findings suggest the need for ongoing examination of evidence-based treatments in writing for young elementary students.