Trend Analysis of Professional Competences of Sports Teachers and Coaches

Current reforms in the Latvian general education system, which require switching to competence-based learning, have determined the topicality of the study. An interesting issue is the development of basic professional competences of working educators. Thus, the research aim is a comparative study of manifestations of professional competence in Latvian sports teachers and coaches. The research method used was Medvedeva’s Teacher General Education Competences Survey (TGECS), which contains 46 items combined into 5 professional competency scales: project development; organizational; student achievement and education problem monitoring; interaction in the education process, and professional self-improvement. Based on the results obtained, professional competence profiles of sports teachers and coaches are suggested. High professional competence scores were established for coaches. Important profile features of professional competence are organizational and interaction competences. For both sports teachers and coaches, the monitoring competence shows lower scores.