Adolescent Preventive Health and Team-Games-Tournaments: Five Decades of Evidence for an Empirically Based Paradigm

Abstract

The problematic behaviors of teenagers and the subsequent negative consequences are extensive and well documented: unwanted pregnancy, substance abuse, violent behavior, depression, and social and psychological consequences of unemployment. In this article, the authors review an approach that uses a cooperative learning, empirically based intervention that employs peers as teachers. This intervention of choice is Teams-Games-Tournaments (TGT), a paradigm backed by five decades of empirical support. The application of TGT in preventive health programs incorporates elements in common with other prevention programs that are based on a public health orientation and constitute the essential components of health education, that is, skills training and practice in applying skills. The TGT intervention supports the idea that children and adolescents from various socioeconomic classes, between the ages of 8 and 18 and in classrooms or groups ranging in size from 4 to 17 members, can work together for one another. TGT has been applied successfully in such diverse areas as adolescent development, sexuality education, psychoactive substance abuse education, anger control, coping with depression and suicide, nutrition, comprehensive employment preparation, and family intervention. This article reviews the extensive research on TGT using examples of successful projects in substance abuse, violence, and nutrition. Issues are raised that relate to the implementation of preventive health strategies for adolescents, including cognitive aspects, social and family networks, and intervention components.

Health education strategies targeting maternal and child health

“…However, lectures have been criticized for their low effectiveness and the lack of participant interaction. [36] Furthermore, more pro-active methodologies have the potential to adapt to different educational needs, both for mothers looking for more information and for those requiring other resources. [37]…”

The Effects of Team-Game-Tournaments Application towards Learning Motivation and Motor Skills in College Physical Education

“…The TGT spirit is that the success of the team depends on the success of individual members, whose learning is enhanced through the establishment of a tournament for mutual competition and growth, enabling students to demonstrate their concentration and active participation [46]. As stated by Wodarski and Feit [47], and Chen and Chen [48], TGT provides students with the opportunity to interact with their peers while learning, and the improvement of the incentive mechanism has a positive impact on the motivation of continuous improvement and students' learning process. If viewed according to the motivation theory model by Pintrich [49], individuals who are oriented toward goals and have higher expectations for success are more likely to be engaged in their work and persist rather than give up when they encounter difficulties.…”

Pre-Service Primary Teachers’ Opinions on Team-Games-Tournaments

“…Paino (2001) stated that students like intergroup competition in TGT. Also other researchers stated that TGT is useful in terms of friendship, liking school, self-esteem (Slavin & Karweit, 1981), improving peer tutoring (Slavin, 1975), affects opinions about teaching, intrinsic values, and self-efficacy positively (Tombak & Altun, 2016), and increases motivation towards learning (Nadrah, Tolla, Ali, & Muris, 2017), communication skills (Veloo, Md-Ali, & Chairany, 2016), student satisfaction (González, Jennings, & Manriquez, 2014), peer relations (Harmandar & Çil, 2008), individual and social reliance (Şahin, 2011), and anger management (Wodarski & Feit, 2011).…”