STROKE

Skills development in and ThRough snoOKEr (STROKE)

The Project

Members of the project are: Bulgaria (Coordinator) and the partner countreis are: Iceland, France, United Kingdom, Italy, Romania and Portugal.

Participants

Bulgarian snooker federation
European billiards and snooker association, France
National boarding school Canopoleno
Krefjandi NGO in Iceland
National High School in Finance and Business (NHSFB)

Our approach

January 2017 to December 2018

About

The project aims to develop interdisciplinary educational program, which will combine skills in snooker, Maths, Physics and functional skills. The innovative program will include different modules according to the skills, knowledge and age of the target group.

Results

The project aims to upgrade the concept of functional snooker with learning materials for students age 13 and upwards and apply it in the partnering countries as a successful tool for developing new skills in Maths, Physics and functional skills.

Project idea:

The main objective of the project is to promote education in and through snooker and support the implementation of the EU Guidelines Dual Careers of Athletes by establishing a partnership of key organizations in the field of snooker, formal and informal education, innovation and technologies who will develop and implement innovative educational program, designed to combine effectively snooker training and compulsory education.

The program will be developed in collaboration with all the organizations involved and will be implemented by all of them addressing and reflecting the specific needs of the relevant target group they work with: students and athletes-students. The aim is to create a program that will address as much as possible target groups, involved in formal education and snooker training and provide them the right tool to facilitate their studying and training process and effectively to combine them.

The inclusion of snooker content in the program will contribute to the recognition of the advantages of informal learning through snooker, as a complement to formal education and aims at encouraging the integration snooker in the curricula of traditional school subjects in order to provide more comprehensive and practically oriented approach to the matter. Moreover the education through snooker develops constructive skills and competences necessary for employability, in connection with sustainable and inclusive growth such as: concentration techniques, dealing with pressure, consistency, precision, tact, strategy.

The inclusion of study material, part of the formal education, in the training program of the young snooker athletes will minimize the educational gaps in the school material, which athletes often have due to the intensive training and competitions at home and abroad. The program will provide educational support to snooker athletes during their sporting career by supporting their formal education with innovative learning tools, combining snooker and new skills development in key school subjects.

The project aims to develop interdisciplinary educational program, which will combine skills in snooker, Maths, Physics and (ICT). The educational and social advantages of playing snooker have been recognized by the experts in the field. A concept called “functional snooker” has been developed and successfully applied in snooker clubs in the UK. Functional Snooker has been recognised as a good practice in teaching English and Maths through sport.

Special objectives

To establish a sustainable transnational network of sport and educational institutions across Europe aiming to exchange good practices and experiences in using sport as educational tool for gaining new skills and knowledges.
To increase the skills development in the field of Maths, physics and functional skills of students/athletes by creating interdisciplinary educational program that can be easily tailored in formal and informal educational and sports organizations.
To increase the capacity of coaches and teachers regarding training in relevant subjects by providing them educational and pedagogical tools to provide qualitative holistic support to the snooker athletes.
To create the right environment for sustainable dual careers by making sport and educational institutions more efficient in meeting the needs of students-athletes
To raise awareness at national and European level about the educational values of sport and in particular snooker and the benefits of dual careers.

Project activities at a glance

Work Package 1

PROJECT MANAGEMENT AND COORDINATION

Elaboration of a coordination and review procedures together with a steering group for innovation
Ongoing risk monitoring
Budget monitoring and control in order to ensure cost efficiency and to preserve proper budget allocation
Elaboration of subcontracting procedures and their management – terms of reference, draft contracts for subcontracting
Proper technical and financial filing of the project
Reporting – interim and final
Four project management team meetings vis-a-vis at different stages of the project activities implementation. The rest of the communication will be online.

Work Package 2

RESEARCH & PREPARATION

The project team will be consisted of three teams: school teachers, snooker experts and trainers, experts in the field of innovation. At the beginning of the project their field of expertise will be unfamiliar for most of the other experts, but during the project they will have to prepare common activities to achieve common objectives. In this regard they will have to bring together their fields of expertise to produce the interdisciplinary program under the project. In order to do so:
- School teachers will prepare a concise report on the content of the relevant school subjects that will be included in the program
- Snooker experts will prepare a report on the snooker training program
- Experts in the field of innovation & technologies will prepare a report on best practices on how technologies and innovations can contribute to the learning and training and how snooker can be used for educational purposes through technology.

They will present their reports in the seminar in the UK. Every group will work separately from the others through Skype meetings.

Seminar in two parts:

Part 1: for presenting the FUNCTIONAL SNOOKER concept (hosted by the UK) In the seminar will participate experts in the field of snooker and will present the methodology, strengths, weaknesses of the functional snooker.

Part 2: Presentation of the reports. Development of common methodology for development of the program, work plan, distribution of tasks for the experts in every country.

Work Package 3

DEVELOPMENT OF “INNOVATIVE SNOOKER CONCEPT”

Aim of WP 3: Developing a training program/educational curricula for using ISC as an (additional) educational
tool. In this activity the different modules of the program will be developed depending on the age of the target
group and the expertise of the partners.

Development of written and video training resources for students and snooker athletes
Development of written and video training resources for snooker coaches and teachers
Development of eLearning web-based educational platform for students and snooker athletes

Work Package 4

IMPLEMENTATION

Aim of WP 4: Experimenting/testing the ISC as educational tool by implementing it in different educational
institutions and sports club according to the partners` expertise

Trainings for the snooker coaches and the teachers in the programme specifics in the five
countries. The coaches will improve their pedagogical qualifications, numeracy skills by
participating at the experiment and the teachers will improve their skills in presenting the
study material in an interesting and innovative way.
Testing the ISC concept on different target groups – snooker athletes and students in different
levels of education.
Gathering lessons learned and evaluation of the results. The partners will analyse the pilot transfer of the ISC practice and outline strategies for its implementation in each partner country and on European level.
Project meeting to exchange experience and know – how in implementing the program.

Work Package 5

COMMUNICATION AND DISSEMINATION

Elaborating a communication strategy
Elaboration of internet platform to promote the project activities and results
Organization of 5 national multiplier events in 5 partner countries to spread knowledge about
INNOVATIVE SNOOKER CONCEPT (ISC).
The events will present the project results to educational and sport institutions, local and national
authorities. They will take place in a sports hall or outdoor and will include demonstration of the new
concept by the students that took part in the testing program and snooker demonstrations.
Press Conferences in all partner countries
Organization of 1 closing international sport event in SOFIA.
Social media coverage