I finished my week 3 basketball challenge. I feel that all of my three skills were improved. I started enjoying challenging myself by increasing the releasing speed when shooting. Here is the data of the result of each of my drills.
| 3-pointers | Jump shots | Layups | |
| DAY 1 | 51/80 | 53/80 | 70/80 |
| DAY 2 | 49/80 | 50/80 | 69/80 |
| DAY 3 | 55/80 | 31/80 | 56/80 |
My results were decent in the first day. I got expected well-performance on 3-pointers (63% is a pretty decent rate in terms of non-professional basketball players ), jump shots, and especially layups. The second day had almost the same result as the first day. However, during a pick-up game in the second day, my right foot got a little sprain, causing the lower successful rate for the last day. The best time for me to practice is still 10:00 to 12:00. But according to the CARSA schedule, the courts are booked for several days in next week. So I should probably reschedule the practicing time for next week. The most difficult part of this training was being able to continue on my plan after my right foot injured. Even though the sprain didn’t affect a lot, I still made myself slow down when doing the drills. Persistence is also one of the keys to success.
In designing learning section, I found that sometimes learners will face problems with learning environment. Ferris Bueller’s economics teacher had a dull and dry way of delivering lectures, showing a issue of learning environment. The way the teacher had taught reminded me of some Youtube basketball teachers who only talk without showing actual skills. The basketball coach only describes the theoretical way to shoot jump shots, without actually showing how to execute a jump shot by performing one, which is not conductive to learning.
Simply watching YouTube basketball tutorials is not enough for improvement. In order to enhance my basketball skills, I need to actively execute my plan and push myself out of comfort zone every time when I am practicing. This is because learning is about what students do, not what teachers do. According to the part 1 video, the teachers concern what students do are categorized as level three teachers. The reason why they are categorized as the top teachers is because they are caring about the products and learning outcomes, which is the best way to measure students’ abilities. Applying this idea to my training, I should actively care about what I can improve. I should keep working hard, trying to shoot in the form of what coaches taught me to do. Practicing shooting in my brain with my imagination would not work in enhancement. I have to actually execute my planning and do the drills, which can make me improve.
I need to use high level cognitive skills to learn shooting and layups. I cannot simply just memorize what Youtube videos told me to do. I ought to think if the way that coaches taught actually suitable for my situation, which is the process of evaluating and critiquing. For example, a Youtuber coach says in order to make stable shots, everyone needs to use their wrist strength to shoot. However, when I am practicing shooting, I feel that simply using writs strength is not enough for shooting 3-pointers. I also need to utilize more arm and legs strength to make the ball goes further. Since I am not a professional basketball player, I need to put strength from other parts of body to shoot, not merely writs strength. The Youtube coach was asking audience to use full wrist strength is probably because he assumed that we all have enough wrist strength. In this way, I use high level cognitive skills of critiquing and assessing the coach’s teaching, in order to find a most suitable approach for me to improve.
Constructive alignment needs to exist every time when learning occurs. The outcomes of a learning experience ought to be aligned with the learning methodologies. Since the goal for me to learn playing basketball is to make all my shooting rates over 80%, if the assessment of my learning is through writing exams, testing my theoretical knowledge of shooting balls. Then, it shows the lack of constructive alignment. I could just memorize the knowledge, gaining 100% in the knowledge test without even touching the ball.
Blended learning experience in a way that creates purposeful communities of inquiry should follow the seven principles. Three presences of COI are cognitive, social, and teaching. The first designed principle focuses on social presence. Social presence should be cooperated with cognitive presence, and it is also the crucial step before building cognitive presence. Students with the purpose of being socially present, they have to have the chances to interact with each other. Facilitating the social interaction, and promoting active discourse collaboratively, can build familiarity, safety, and reliability among learners. This cognitive presence can make them getting deep into learning. Also, teaching presence is the central element in COI. It contains three elements which are “design and organization, facilitation, and direct instruction”. These three elements are affecting each other, which are not mutually exclusive.
I feel that in order to apply blended learning of COI and its three presences to my learning in basketball. I should firstly find a group of people who are also willing to learn playing basketball. I should keep interacting with those players, talking about the basketball skills and trying to solve their problems according to my own experience. Teaching others and asking questions in this basketball community can be two best approaches for me to better myself and get deep into learning playing basketball, which can generally build a simple form of COI. Everyone in the community is responsible for designing, organizing, facilitating, and directing teaching process. In this way, everyone in the basketball community are able to improve skills together.
References:
Erik Yu 
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