How Can Pedagogical Strategies Empower Student-Coaches During a Sport Education Season? A Collaborative Action Research Study with Preservice Teachers

This study examined how pedagogical strategies can support student-coaches’ (SCs) empowerment and promote preservice teachers’ (PSTs) professional learning within Sport Education (SE) seasons. Sixty-seven tenth-grade students (aged 15–18) participated in SE units taught by three PSTs (two males, one female, aged 22–25) enrolled in a master’s degree program in Teaching of Physical Education in Primary and Secondary Education in northern Portugal. Data were collected through participant observation, informal and focus group interviews, and PSTs’ reflective diaries within a Collaborative Action Research (CAR) framework and analyzed thematically. Three CAR cycles addressed key challenges: (1) encouraging SCs to assume responsibility for their role, (2) fostering inclusive and supportive team interactions, (3) strengthening SCs’ sport-specific and instructional knowledge. Guided by a facilitator, PSTs implemented strategies including pre-lesson meetings, structured communication routines, task-modification and feedback cards, accountability systems, and visual identification of SCs. Findings suggest that SCs’ empowerment was progressively constructed through interconnected psychological, relational and pedagogical processes, supported by structured mediation and iterative reflection. Simultaneously, engagement in CAR cycles enabled PSTs to develop adaptive instructional decision-making and mediation strategies. The study highlights how empowerment in SE is shaped through relational and pedagogical conditions and illustrates how CAR can foster reciprocal learning between SCs and PSTs in authentic teacher education contexts.