Since the Teaching Games for Understanding approach was founded by David Bunker and Rod Thorpe in 1982, it has gone on to become a key piece of the coaching literature around the world, with an international conference taking place on the topic bi-annually.
At the 2019 UK Coaching Conference, Rod chatted to UK Coaching's Head of Talent and Performance Nick Levett about the birth and early history of the model. He explains that his number one priority when developing the approach was simply to "challenge the way coaches think" during sessions in response to traditional, technique-led approaches to games teaching and learning that many children and young people found dissatisfying and disengaging.
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