Investigation Research On Amateur Radio Direction Finding (ARDF) Sports Of Primary School In Wuxi City

Amateur radio direction finding(ARDF),also known as radio orienteering and radio-sport,is a kind of a timed race in which individual competitor utilises radio direction finding apparatus to navigate and find several hidden radio transmitters.The sport has attracted more and more students to participate in due to its unknown challenges and fun.Meanwhile,the core values of ARDF,which emphasis the physical,mental and spiritual exercises for the competitors,have drawn the attention of educational departments from all levels.In March 2015,the Education Bureau of Wuxi City and Wuxi City Association for Science and Technology jointly announced the Notice on the Conduct of Radio Direction Finding Competition in Wuxi Primary and Secondary Schools,which has officially introduced ARDF to all schools in Wuxi.Wuxi is the first prefecture-level city in Jiangsu Province where ARDF is promoted by the governmental education authorities.However,the ARDF sports and competition targeting on primary and secondary students are yet to be widely investigated by researchers.Therefore,the research on ARDF in primary schools in Wuxi is of great necessity and significance.On one hand,it is helpful to comprehensively,accurately and systematically grasp and understand the development status,problems and influencing factors,of which the research outcome is positively related to three aspects,i.e.i)the development of relevant policies of the educational authorities in Wuxi,ii)guidance for teachers in all primary school to further promote ARDF;iii)encouragement of parents and students to more proactively participate in ARDF.On the other hand,this research can help explore the “Wuxi model” of ARDF,which provides effective experience for the popularisation and development of ARDF in other prefecture-level cities.In this dissertation,the development and promotion of ARDF sports in Wuxi is employed as the major research object.Several methodologies have been adopted to analyse the reasons of launching the ARDF in Wuxi City,including literature review,expert interviews,questionnaire survey,mathematical statistics,logic analysis,etc.School principals,teachers,students and parents from 12 primary schools which have already practiced the sports of ARDF have been interviewed and the analysis of their responses to the investigation lead to the main conclusions as follows:(1)The ARDF in Wuxi is promoted by the municipal education department and relies on project resource advantage provided by the local university,Jiangsu College of Information and Technology(ARDF training base of Jiangsu Province),which both act as a strong support and guarantee for the development of ARDF.(2)Leaders of primary schools in Wuxi highly value the significance of carrying out ARDF and agree that it accords the education and teaching policies.Moreover,strong support in the human resource,finance and other aspects has been provided.However,major factors affecting the development of ARDF in primary school are concentrated on the shortage of teachers and lack of support from superior leaders.(3)The majority of instructors of ARDF in Wuxi are middle-aged teachers of other subjects,which are not professional enough.The instructors are enthusiastic in the ARDF-related work and keen to improve their skills in ARDF.Nevertheless,they are also looking forward to receiving more support from superior level,school leaders and parents.(4)ARDF is very popular among primary school students and they are taking rather serious attitude towards ARDF.It is also widely believed that learning ARDF does not affect their study of other subjects but rather can stimulate their learning enthusiasm.According to the survey,80% of the students are satisfied with the course and trainings provided by their school while the rest 20% of the students are seeking for more resources to meet their needs in learning ARDF.(5)Despite the lack of a comprehensive understanding of ARDF,most parents warmly support children's participation in the sports and are willing to participate in the parent-child interactive activities.Meanwhile,majority of the parents support their children in extracurricular professional training and ARDF competitions.The proportion of parents which are in favour of participating ARDF games is slightly higher than the training.Furthermore,it is recognised by the parents that the major factor that discourages students to participate in ARDF sports is the lack of understanding and instructions from expertise to this sport.