Showing papers in "Journal of Teaching in Physical Education in 2004"

Effects of a Sport Education Intervention on Students’ Motivational Responses in Physical Education

Abstract: This study looked at the influence of a Sport Education intervention program on students’ motivational responses in a high school physical education setting. Two intact groups were assigned curricular interventions: the Sport Education group (n = 25), which received eight 60-min lessons, and the comparison group (n = 26), which received a traditional teaching approach to sportbased activity. Pre- and postintervention measures of student enjoyment, perceived effort, perceived competence, goal orientations, perceived motivational climate, and perceived autonomy were obtained for both groups. Repeatedmeasures ANOVAs showed significant increases in student enjoyment and perceived effort in the Sport Education group only. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that increases in task-involving climate and perceived autonomy explained a significant amount of unique variance in the Sport Education students’ postintervention enjoyment, perceived effort, and perceived competence responses. The results suggest that the Sport Education curriculum may increase perceptions of a task-involving climate and perceived autonomy, and in so doing, enhance the motivation of high school students toward physical education.

Motivational Climate, Motor-Skill Development, and Perceived Competence: Two Studies of Developmentally Delayed Kindergarten Children

Abstract: Two studies were conducted to examine the effects of motivational climate on motor-skill development and perceived physical competence in kindergarten children with developmental delays. In Experiment 1, two intervention groups were exposed to environments with either high (mastery climate) or low autonomy for 12 weeks. Results showed that the mastery-climate group demonstrated significantly better locomotor performance and higher perceived physical competence postintervention than did the low-autonomy group, although both groups improved in locomotor and object-control skill performance. The second investigation extended the findings of the first by determining that the intervention effects were present 6 months later. In summary, the masteryclimate group showed positive changes in skill development and perceived physical competence, and this positive pattern of change was maintained over time.

The Effects of Choice on the Motivation of Adolescent Girls in Physical Education

Abstract: This study examined the motivational responses of adolescent girls in the physical education setting to having choices of walking activities. Seventh and 8th grade girls (N = 1,110) in 42 intact physical education classes participated in this study. Classes were randomly assigned to choice (n = 21) and no-choice (n = 21) groups. Participants’ situational and contextual motivation was assessed using the Situational Motivation Scale (SIMS) and the Sport Motivation Scale for PE (SMSPE). The SIMS was administered every 3 days during the intervention. The SMSPE was administered as the pre- and posttest. Significant differences indicated that the choice group (a) was more intrinsically motivated, (b) had higher identified regulation, (c) experienced less external control, and (d) was less amotivated. Moderate to large effect sizes were noted. A significant difference in amotivation at the contextual level was noted. Results suggest that adolescent female PE students may be more motivated if given choices. The n...

The Emotional Dimensions of a Teacher’s Pedagogical Content Knowledge: Influences on Content, Curriculum, and Pedagogy

Abstract: Although teachers’ knowledge of student emotion is not typically integrated into studies of teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge, this study uses the philosophy of emotion, recent teacher knowledge research, and a case study of one middle-school physical education teacher to illustrate the point that how teachers understand student emotion is inextricably linked to their thinking and decisions about educational content, curriculum, and pedagogy. Data were collected during 4 months of observations and interviews and were analyzed using constant comparison. Three themes are used to show how this teacher’s interpretations of student emotion influenced her selecting, ordering, and formulating of curriculum units, her pedagogical maneuvering during lessons to facilitate learning, and her interactions with individual students and groups of students. The discussion centers on the need to expand current conceptions of teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge, and the importance of emotional understanding in tea...

Sport education: promoting team affiliation through physical education

Abstract: The development of feelings of identity, the sense of belonging to a team, and the growth of social skills are experiences that sport, if properly conducted, is well placed to offer (Siedentop, 1994). Evidence suggests that some characteristics of traditional, multiactivity forms of physical education work against realizing these goals (Locke, 1992). Siedentop's Sport Education (SE) model is one attempt to overcome this shortcoming by recasting units as seasons and maintaining persisting groups as teams throughout the season. Extended units intended to foster team affiliation while promoting affective and social development are common objectives in physical education. We report on a 16-week SE unit that includes over 70 Year-5 students (9- to 10-year-olds) from one UK school. Our findings show that the opportunity to become affiliated with a team was an attractive feature of the pupils' physical education experience and that, under the framework of SE, there was an obvious investment made by the Year-5 Forest Gate students in relation to their sense of identity and involvement as members of a persisting group.

Measuring Students’ Physical Activity Levels: Validating SOFIT for Use with High-School Students

Abstract: This study was conducted to validate the System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time (SOFIT) for measuring physical activity levels of high-school students. Thirty-five students (21 girls and 14 boys from grades 9-12) completed a standardized protocol including lying, sitting, standing, walking, running, curl-ups, and push-ups. Heart rates and Energy Expenditure, that is, oxygen uptake, served as concurrent validity criteria. Results indicate that SOFIT discriminates accurately among high-school students’ sedentary behaviors (i.e., lying down, sitting, standing) and moderate to vigorous physical activity behavior and is recommended for use in research and assessment of physical activity levels in physical education classes for this age group. Implications for use of SOFIT by both researchers and teachers in physical education are described, as well.

Reproducing Gender? Intergenerational Links and the Male PE Teacher as a Cultural Conduit in Teaching Physical Education

Abstract: Drawing on illustrations from a recent life history study that focused on male student teachers as they negotiated their way through a 1-year postgraduate certificate in education (PGCE) physical education teacher training course at a university in England, this paper explores how teachers are implicated in the social construction of gender relations in teaching physical education and school sport. The perspective forwarded is that the embodied gendered dispositions student teachers bring into the profession constitute a powerful influence on their professional behavior, and that the development and legitimation of these dispositions might be traced to key relationships with other physical education and coaching professionals. In so doing, we identify key moments in a process of cultural reproduction and conclude that teachers might be viewed as intergenerational living links or cultural conduits in the construction and transmission of particular gender orientations and practices in the profession. We conclude that future research needs to be intergenerational in focus if we are to better understand how these links act as channels in reproducing gender relations and how we might rupture and challenge them.

Critical Inquiry on the Body in Girls’ Physical Education Classes: A Critical Poststructural Perspective

Abstract: Drawing on poststructuralism and related theoretical perspectives, we worked in girls’ physical education classes to examine the development and implementation of a curriculum strand focusing on girls’ bodies. The purpose was to help adolescent girls name the discourses that shape their lives and regulate their bodies. We asked two major questions: What were the major tasks actually used during the enactment of the curriculum strand? and: What issues and concerns emerged for us as we enacted the strand and how did we respond? This study took place in a 7th–12th grade rural high school in the southern United States. We collected data during the 2000–2001 school year in three girls’ physical education classes. We conducted 14 sessions for each class and analyzed our data using the constant comparison method. Several issues emerged including: making the curriculum meaningful, offsetting task difficulties, sustaining ethical relationships, and lessening interference of research culture.

The Emperor’s New Clothes: Fat, Thin, and Overweight. The Social Fabrication of Risk and Ill Health

Abstract: It is now well over 60 years since the publication in Britain of the Board of Education’s (1933) Syllabus For Physical Training For Schools. It was a remarkable document, not only for the amount of detail it provided on the teaching of physical education, no doubt necessary for a teaching force then predominantly untrained to teach it, but also for the status it was accorded (then called physical training) in the elementary school curriculum. “The development of a good physique” and the provision of an “efficient system of physical training” were seen as nothing less than a matter of “national importance” as “vital to the welfare, even the survival of the race” (p. 8). The echoes of war, general economic recession, and widespread social deprivation unsoftened by the supporting structures of a welfare state had much to do with the Board’s emphasis on the production, promotion, and maintenance of fitness for health. Throughout the syllabus the social and medical functions of physical training loomed large. An efficient system of physical training could help compensate, but not correct, alleviate, or act as a “remedy for all (British economic and social) ills” (Board of Education, 1933, p. 8). Such was their magnitude that the Board acknowledged (in a manner not always so prevalent in more recent health reports) that physical training had its curative limits. Even so, it went on somewhat optimistically to claim that the syllabus could, “if rightly and faithfully used, widely adopted and reasonably interpreted, yield an abundant harvest of recreation, improved physique and national health” (p. 8). Physical education has long been associated officially with the development and maintenance of the health of school children in the United Kingdom (UK), as in the United States (US) and elsewhere (see Kirk, 1992, 2004). Over the past 20 years this association has become even stronger. Since the 1980’s “health issues” began to be featured regularly in the physical education literature, first in the form of expressions of commitment to “health related fitness,” later renamed “health related education” and, thereafter, increasingly in mainstream physical education programs in schools (see Fox, 1991; Penney & Harris, 2004). A commitment to certain elements of health education is now embedded in the National Curriculum for Physical Education (NCPE) to which all pupils between the ages of 5 and 16

Exploring the Relevance of the Personal and Social Responsibility Model in Adapted Physical Activity: A Collective Case Study

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to examine the application of the Personal and Social Responsibility Model (PSRM) in an adapted physical activity program. Although the PSRM was developed for use with underserved youth, scholars in the field of adapted physical activity have noted its potential relevance for children with disabilities. Using a collective case study, we explored the relevance and perceived benefits of the PSRM in an adapted martial arts program. Participants were five male children with spastic diplegic cerebral palsy. Data sources included observational field notes, medical records, and interviews with participants’ physicians, therapists, and parents. The following themes were generated from the data: increased sense of ability, positive feelings about the program, positive social interactions, and therapeutic relevance. These results indicate that the PSRM can be made relevant to children with disabilities, especially when coupled with appealing and therapeutically relevant content.

School Physical Education in the Post-Report Era: An Analysis from Public Health

Abstract: The 1996 United States Surgeon General’s report on physical activity and health represents a watershed moment in the modern history of physical activity and public health. Based on a compelling body of scientific evidence from the fields of medicine, epidemiology, physiology, and health psychology, the Surgeon General’s report proclaimed that people of all ages could improve their health and quality of life through lifelong practice of moderate physical activity (United States Department of Health and Human Services [USDHHS], 1996). Physical Activity and Health: A Report of the Surgeon General was an especially important publication for school physical education. Not only did the report acknowledge the importance of regular physical activity during childhood and adolescence, it also identified school physical education as an important vehicle for promoting healthenhancing physical activity in young people. “With evidence that success in this arena is possible, every effort should be made to encourage schools to require daily physical education in each grade and to promote physical activities that can be enjoyed throughout life” (USDHHS, 1996, p. 6). The purpose of this article is to discuss the status of school physical education since the release of the Surgeon General’s report on physical activity and health nearly a decade ago. Specifically, the article will address four questions: 1) What has been the historical role of physical education in physical activity and public health? 2) What impact, if any, has the Surgeon General’s report has had on physical education programs? 3) What impact should physical education have on public health and physical activity? 4) What should teacher education programs in physical education do to prepare physical education teachers, given the current role of physical education?

Nonspecialist, Preservice Primary-School Teachers: Predicting Intentions to Teach Physical Education

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to establish the utility of the Theory of Planned Behavior in predicting nonspecialist, preservice primary-school teachers’ intentions to teach physical education for 2 hr per week. A questionnaire was developed, according to the recommended procedures, and was administered to 128 final-year teacher trainees in two Primary Teacher Training courses in England. A variety of predictors were identified, including beliefs of significant others, such as parents; a positive assessment of control over difficult barriers; and experiences of past (teaching) behavior. The most significant predictor in discriminating between intenders and nonintenders, however, was personal exercise behavior. Helping preservice primary-school teachers become more physically active themselves might positively influence their intent to teach physical education 2 hr per week more than alleviating barriers to teaching physical education.

Physical Activity Levels in Elementary-School Physical Education: A Comparison of Swimming and Nonswimming Classes

Abstract: The main goal of the current study was to compare physical activity levels during swimming and nonswimming elementary physical education classes. We conducted a preliminary study and found that the System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time (SOFIT) could be used to register physical activity engagement levels in swimming classes. Thirty-nine classes, involving 8- to 12-year olds, participated in one swimming and one nonswimming physical education class. Classes were videotaped and physical activity levels for 234 students were quantified using SOFIT. Students engaged in more moderate-to-vigorous physical activity during swimming classes than during nonswimming classes. As a consequence, we advocate the inclusion of swimming lessons in physical education. Because the average engagement in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity was lower than the recommended 50% in 41% of swimming classes and in 77% of the nonswimming classes, however, comprehensive efforts are needed to increase physical activity levels...

Possibilities and pitfalls of a public health agenda for physical education

Abstract: The 1996 Surgeon General’s Report (SGR), Physical Activity and Health, was one of the more significant U.S. federal documents to outline national priorities for health and physical activity. In this monograph Marlene Tappe and Charlene Burgeson and Stephen Cone remind us that Physical Activity and Health was the third in a series of Surgeon General reports focused on the health of the U.S. population over the last 40 years. The first was the 1960 SG report titled Tobacco and Health and the second, published in 1988, focused on Nutrition and Health. Of the three, the 1996 report has had most relevance to the physical education profession because it spoke directly to our primary concern, physical activity or human movement. The editors’ decision to devote a Journal of Teaching in Physical Education monograph to a critique of the relationships between physical education, physical activity, and public health using the 1996 SGR as a watershed was insightful. Sport pedagogists and public-health professionals alike can benefit. Their invitations to the lead authors working in the U.S. and the U.K. to write about these relationships globally and the implications for physical education and teacher education have resulted in a thought-provoking monograph. These authors represent U.S. leaders of professional organizations as well as a diversity of national and international scholars from subdisciplines in our field including sociology, epidemiology, exercise physiology, and sport pedagogy. All have brought to their task expertise in and passion for quality physical activity and/or physical education. The authors were charged to respond to the following four questions:

Impact of the Surgeon General’s Report: Through the Eyes of Physical Education Teacher Educators

Abstract: Things change in physical education, but changes are often slow and might go unnoticed. Termed the “chameleon of all curricula” (McKenzie, 2001), physical education has historically played a utilitarian role and has adapted both to meet societal needs and to survive as a profession. The founding fathers of physical education in North America were primarily medical doctors, and their focus on physical fitness and health has held remarkably steadfast over time. This occurred despite attempts to take the profession in different directions, often to the angst of important leaders such as Eleanor Metheney, who stated 40 years ago, “We are back where we started from a hundred years ago, and the tattered old biological banner of physical fitness is again waving triumphantly from our educational battlements.” (Metheney, 1965, p.101). While the “fitness first” banner has been recycled as the main goal of physical education for nearly 150 years, it has rarely been unfurled in the name of public health. Rather, it was waved to engage individuals in the pursuit of personal fitness pursuits or prepare citizenry for battle during wars (e.g., World Wars I and II, Korean Conflict) and establish national pride in sports (e.g., Olympic Games), and fitness (e.g., Kraus-Webber testing) competitions. Physical fitness and physical activity are both associated with health, but it is important to distinguish between them. Physical fitness is an outcome, whereas physical activity is a process—one frequently defined as “any bodily movement produced by skeletal muscles that results in energy expenditure” (Caspersen, 1989, p. 425). Physical fitness has historically been considered the pathway to healthful living (Hockey, 1989), and physical education has focused on it, often to the exclusion of physical activity (Freedson & Rowland, 1992), particularly if the activity was of low or moderate intensity. Toward the end of the 20th century the profession began to stress exercise engagement—a subcategory of physical activity that demands activity be performed at an intensity high enough to produce biological changes. Fitness and fitness tests have traditionally been associated with sports excellence (i.e., skill-related fitness; Hunsicker & Reiff, 1966), but in the mid 1970s professional organizations began to emphasize health-related fitness in their testing programs (e.g., Blair, Falls, & Pate, 1983). As a result, most school students in the past 30 years have been assessed using one or more health–fitness batteries

Pay Me Now or Pay Me Later: 10 Years Later and Have We Seen Any Change?

Abstract: Do you remember the 1970’s FRAM oil-filter commercial where a mechanic was holding an inexpensive oil filter and then points to an expensive enginerepair job? The tag line was “Pay Me Now or Pay Me Later.” This tag line reflects the attitude our profession holds for physical education and physical activity. We offer opportunities that lead to good health, but society seems more interested in pursuing the expensive engine repair. We have all read and even know the numbers, by group or state, that reflect the extent of the obesity and chronic-disease crisis in this nation. We have seen health experts across the nation express concern for the raging epidemic of childhood and adolescent obesity. Some researchers even believe that, for the first time in American history, the children currently in school will have a shorter lifespan than their parents. Some experts (Booth & Chakravarthy, 2002) have named the killer Sedentary Death Syndrome (SeDS). Our schools and society, however, have failed to fully use systems that we already have in place. Recognizing quality health and physical education programs as a valuable resource that could contribute to a proactive prevention plan to address this issue is imperative—ignore them and the costs of medical care will continue to rise, while life expectancy and the quality of life will fall. It has been nearly a decade since the 1996 Surgeon General’s Report (SGR) on Physical Activity and Health (United States Department of Health and Human Services [USDHHS], 1996). It is time that we stop and reflect on this historic report and begin the assessment process—are we paying now or will we continue to pay later? This monograph benefits from the expert writings of several authors sharing varied perspectives and addressing four overarching questions. What follows is a personal perspective that will use the overarching theme of physical activity and health to explore the impact of the 1996 SGR, the future role of physical education, the preparation of preservice physical educators, and the impact that selected occurrences have had on this issue. My personal perspective is optimistic in nature although substantive supporting data has not yet been collected. I do, however, remain hopeful that the impact of this landmark report will indeed provide us with the documentation that will help us move forward as a profession.

Physical Education Teacher Attitudes Toward Fitness Test Scale: Development and Validation

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to determine whether the Physical Education Teacher Attitudes Toward Fitness Tests Scale (PETAFTS) produces reliable and valid scores. There were 4 stages and 4 sets of participants in the development of the PETAFTS. First, the domains of attitude were defined and cognitive and affective components were developed, organized, and validated. In the second stage, 134 full-time physical education teachers participated in a pilot study and PETAFTS was revised based on the information obtained. In the third stage, 28 teacher educators served on an expert panel and organized the items into domain areas. In the final stage, 322 physical education teachers from 10 states tested the revised PETAFTS. Based on the results, the PETAFTS was shortened by deleting and combining some of the items in subdomains; this resulted in a 16-item final version that, according to the indices, generates reliable and valid scores.

Health-Based Physical Education in Urban High Schools: The PATH Program

Abstract: National health statistics highlight a serious problem in adolescent girls and boys. Too many teenagers are sedentary, unfit, overweight, and prone to related health consequences (Fagot-Campagna, Pettit, Engelgau, Burrows, & Geiss, 2000; Flegal, 1999; Ogden, Flegal, Carroll, & Johnson, 2002; Troiano & Flegal, 1998). Ethnic teens have been less well studied, even though data clearly show a high prevalence of cardiovascular disease and risk factors in African American and Latino adults (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services [USDHHS], Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], & National Center of Health Statistics, 2003). The purpose of this article is to bring attention to an important public health problem in urban teenagers, to present a unique physical education program that was developed to address the problem, and to provide recommendations for increased emphasis on health-based physical education in teacher preparation programs.

An Investigation of the Self-Regulation Components Students Employ in the Physical Education Setting.

Abstract: Research in educational psychology and sport psychology indicates that school achievement depends on students’ capacity to self-regulate their own learning processes. The purpose of this study was to investigate the self-regulation components employed by students in a natural physical education setting. Twenty-three French students, 14 and 15 years old, were videotaped during their regular physical education class as their teachers taught them a new skill. The students then watched a recording of their performance and provided the researcher with a verbal description of their cognitive activity during the lesson. Verbal data were then analyzed using both qualitative and quantitative techniques. The data revealed that the students employed a 17-component self-regulation model while learning a new skill in the natural physical education context. Three teaching models that emerged for eliciting the identified self-regulation components among students are also discussed.

A Developmental Intervention Via the Teaching Portfolio: Employing the Teaching/Learning Framework

Abstract: Nine teacher candidates from each of two PETE programs, University A and University B, developed teaching portfolios over three consecutive semesters of comparable courses. University A teacher candidates underwent a deliberate, developmental portfolio intervention based on the Teaching/Learning Framework (Sprinthall & Thies-Sprinthall 1983), while University B candidates employed a series of portfolio categories based on reflective practice theory (Wallace, 1991) to guide their developmental growth. All teacher candidates completed Rest’s (1986) Defining Issues Test (DIT) to determine one dimension of teacher developmental growth, moral/ethical judgment. They shared perceptions of the portfolio process through focus group interviews and portfolio questionnaires as qualitative data sources. Findings indicated a significant within-group difference for University A teacher candidates, while both university groups demonstrated similarities in perceptions of the portfolio process. A crucial programmatic diffe...