Our Work

BioLab: Biomechanics Teaching and Learning Toolbox

Description

This project aimed to develop a teachers' resource to improve accessibility and enhance the quality of sports biomechanics teaching and learning within sport-related degree and HND courses.

Contact: Lesley Lawrence

Email: lesley.lawerence@beds.ac.uk

Through the development of a Biomechanics Teaching & Learning Tool Box this project aimed to facilitate an increase in the opportunities for students to study biomechanics from an entry level through to degree level three and beyond.

Sports biomechanics is an essential element of sports science, however learning and teaching in biomechanics is often considered to be more difficult than other disciplines in sport and exercise science because it inherently requires a greater use of mathematics. The inherent difficulties within the subject are exacerbated by the need for dedicated laboratories, qualified technicians, and experienced teaching staff. As a result:

• Research conducted by DMU in 1999/2000 revealed that up to 75% of HND and degree students experience little or no teaching of biomechanics – disadvantaging these students and limiting their opportunities in a number of post-graduate and employment areas
• Few HND courses delivered within the FE sector have any biomechanics element – limiting the access to degree ‘top-up’ courses for students coming from FECs
• Fewer students are able to pursue sports biomechanics at post-graduate level, leading to fewer qualified sports biomechanists, and a national shortage of potential biomechanics lecturers
  

The project had three clearly identifiable objectives:

• To enhance the teaching and learning of sports biomechanics across the higher education sector.
• To enable teachers and departments with limited or no biomechanics-specific laboratory facilities and technical support to engage with laboratory-based experiments and demonstrations in sports biomechanics.
• To widen access and increase opportunity for students to progress from HND and Foundation Degree courses delivered in further education colleges to degree-level sport and exercise science courses containing biomechanics elements.

To achieve these objectives the following resources were developed:

Lecture
• PowerPoint slides broken down into logical subject units
Lab Based
• Experimental ideas and instructions
• Data sets
• Video of experimental data collection

Assessment
• Sample problems & answers
• Ideas for assessments
Classroom Based
• Tutorial ideas
• Problem calculations & answers
Software/Applets
• Animations of key principles
• Interactive activities
• Tools for biomechanical analysis (e.g. digitisation)

Web Resources
• Links to a variety of online biomechanics content
• Links to teaching & learning resources

In addition to the resources listed above tutor notes were supplied to provide ideas as to how the supplied materials might best be utilised. These materials were freely distributed on DVD to Higher and Further Education establishments within the UK.

Organisations / Institutions

DeMontfort University, Manchester Metropolitan University

Start date

End date