WELLBEING
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Training Load |
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Student reflection
I have found the Training Load and Wellbeing Document ( TLWD ) to be an essential part in my training during my time at Sevenoaks .
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Figure 2 . The visual relationship between measures of training load and measures of wellbeing across a twelve-month period . Blue lines are a daily response and Red Lines are Weekly . * for TL denotes a value that is significantly above the injury risk threshold . * for Wellbeing denotes a value that is significantly lower than the average daily assessment of wellbeing .
Wellbeing
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––––––––– Training Load ––––––––– Week Total Wellbeing
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Negative reductions in WB have the potential for disturbance to school attendance and academic progression . Figure 2 identifies six incidences of a reduction in wellbeing , beginning in Michaelmas and continuing into Lent . Referring to the students ’ responses , these troughs were caused by frustrations with training and competition not going to plan due to injury earlier in the year . Further incidences of reductions in WB at the beginning of summer term appeared not to be isolated to sport . A combination of competition stress and committing to a Duke of Edinburgh weekend lead to illness and time off school .
Discussion
The WB questionnaire prompted conversations that otherwise wouldn ’ t have occurred and went some way to supporting holistic development across an academic year , not limited to sport commitment or academic achievement alone . Measuring wellbeing allowed for self-reflection and provided an opportunity to explore perceptions of stress and ways to build some tolerance to it . Stress can be interpreted as a ‘ mismatch between individual ’ s perceptions of the demands of the task and their perceptions of their resources for coping with them ’ ( Stokes and Kite , 2017 ). This case study could be described as an exercise in stress management , and highlights the benefits of exploring an individuals ’ thresholds , and how a students ’ resources might be bolstered to militate against overwhelming responses to events in school life .
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Training load
One of the key benefits of the ‘ Training load ’ part of the TLWD is my ability to effectively monitor how much training I am doing in any given week . In running , knowing when to ‘ push ’ or ‘ pull ’ the amount of training you do is essential : you need to both maintain a high level of training while not increasing too quickly due to risk of injury . It ’ s also often all too easy to miss a couple sessions and forget about it , or to replace them with easier work , but doing this often has a negative effect on training . Therefore , the greatest use of the TLWD for me is that it gives me the ability to compare my training load week on week and ensure that I ’ m being consistent . This is something that I ’ ve improved during my time at Sevenoaks , and the results have improved with it .
Wellbeing
The ‘ Wellbeing ’ part of the TLWD has also been useful , most of all for identifying when something is wrong . Sickness and fatigue , for instance , are both factors in the Wellbeing section , and both can be indicators of overtraining . By monitoring these things through the Wellbeing section , I ’ ve also been able to see when things other than my regular training are having more of an impact on me than I thought . One example of this was DofE which led to a massive dip in my wellbeing . Part of the reason for this was that I carried on training as usual afterwards , in fact increasing my training as if I ’ d had a couple days off . It was in the wellbeing document that I could see a consistent dip in my wellbeing that showed me I should probably be taking the training easy as DofE had clearly had a larger impact on me than I thought .
Future considerations
There is an opportunity to extend use of these questionnaires to a wider group of students as a means of prompting some more detailed and consistent self-reflection . This wouldn ’ t necessarily need to be isolated to sport and potentially including student scholars across academia , music , art and drama could prove a worthwhile step towards monitoring how useful this process is for all students . Of course , the WB questionnaire would need to be edited to ensure appropriate statements relevant to each subject . Additionally , students could use such tools to support their Middle School Diploma and managebac reflections – if tutors had access to this data it might inform conversations in the support of pastoral care .
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