‘Activity choice’ and physical education in England and Wales

Though agencies, such as the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport and the Australian Sports Drug Agency, argue that much effort is being directed toward educating athletes about the virtues of fair play, the risks of drug use, and the ethics of cheating, the primary focus of government led initiatives is catching cheaters through testing. As a result, a decade following the inaugural Canadian Inquiry random drug testing is an accepted part of the culture of elite sport and is recognised as the most powerful deterrent for prospective abusers. As public confidence rests implicitly upon testing as the best and only direct means to establish a fair level of competition, it is perhaps not surprising that little attention is given to the ethical implications of testing as an invasion of privacy. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ethical implications of testing athletes for the use of banned substances and determine if the current course of action is a morally justified suspension of privacy.     

Girls’ bodily activities in physical education How current fitness and sport discourses influence girls’ identity construction

Girls’ identity constructions are influenced by the dominant sport, health and beauty discourses in their society. Recent research indicates that sport and health discourses embedded in physical education (PE) compete for influence. Some of these studies have illustrated how these discourses inform girls’ social construction of body ideals and femininities, as well as their choices among physical activities. Our purpose in posing the question, ‘How are girls’ identity construction in PE influenced by current fitness and sport discourses?’ is to explore their identity construction and how they negotiate within the PE discourse as embodied subjects, as well as how they use their body as an object of display. This study is based on fieldwork among 10th grade students (15-year-olds) in a school in Oslo, Norway. The methods used include participant observation, informal conversations with the students and two group interviews. We hope that our findings concerning how sport and fitness discourses influence the students’ concepts of both the ideal body and their choices among bodily activities in PE will contribute to the debate on the future of PE. In particular, the girls’ embrace of the fitness discourse in PE is relevant to a question of great current concern: How should schools and PE teachers meet and relate to the fitness discourse in contemporary society? We believe that if left unchallenged and permitted to deepen its influence on PE, this discourse may well ensure that body modification becomes the primary purpose of PE.     

Teachers in school sports: between the fields of education and sport?

According to the cultural sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, gaining access to a social space or a position within a social space requires a specific capital. For teachers, this is normally indicated by a valid teaching certificate with relevant subject knowledge. However, when no qualified teachers are available, which is the case for the subject of school sports in Sweden, other assets gain recognition. Drawing on Bourdieu's conceptual framework, this paper examined the conditions for school sports in Sweden, and based on questionnaires answered by 109 teachers, explored the competencies, education and backgrounds teachers in upper secondary school sports possess. The paper address the question: what valuable resources are required to become a teacher of school sports and gain recognition as symbolic capital? The results show that while school sports in Sweden are carried out through a school subject and thus regulated by the government, it is influenced by both the fields of education and sport. Furthermore, the questionnaire results show that a majority of the teachers are employed as coaches instead of teachers and that less than half of them (45%) have a teacher education background, while 95% have a coaching education background. However, the results also show that teachers assessed their competencies for teaching school sports as high, especially with regard to competencies in specific sport skills. In conclusion, this paper shows how coaching education and experience in competitive sports are an important resource required to become a teacher in school sports and is thus recognized as symbolic capital. Therefore, school sports cannot be viewed as a legitimate part of the field of education but can be viewed as a part of the field of sport.     

Does school physical education really contribute to accelerometer-measured daily physical activity and non sedentary behaviour in high school students?

Physical education has been highlighted as an important environment for physical activity promotion, however, to our knowledge there are no previous studies examining the contribution of physical education to daily accelerometer-measured physical activity and non sedentary behaviour. The purpose was to compare the accelerometer-measured physical activity and sedentary behaviour between physical education, non-physical education and weekend days in adolescents. Of the 394 students from a Spanish high school that were invited to participate, 158 students (83 boys and 75 girls) aged 13–16 years were analyzed (wear time ≥ 600 min). Participants’ physical activity and sedentary behaviour were objectively-measured by GT3X+ accelerometers during physical education (one session), non-physical education and weekend days. Results indicated that overall adolescents had statistically significant greater physical activity levels and lower values of sedentary behaviour on physical education days than on non-physical education and weekend days (e.g., moderate-to-vigorous physical activity = 71, 54 and 57 min; sedentary = 710, 740 and 723 min) (p < 0.05). Physical education contributes significantly to reducing students’ daily physical inactivity and sedentary behaviour. Increasing the number of physical education classes seems to be an effective strategy to reduce the high current prevalence of physical inactivity and sedentary behaviour in adolescence.     

Health by stealth – exploring the sociocultural dimensions of salutogenesis for sport,health and physical education research

Sport, health and physical education (SHPE) researchers have increasingly embraced the salutogenic model of health devised by Aaron Antonvosky, to re-understand and problematise the relation between movement, physical activity or physical education on one hand, and health on the other. However, contemporary research employing Antonovsky's theories has almost exclusively focused on the sense of coherence scale. In so doing, we suggest salutogenic researchers have missed opportunities to explore the sociological aspects of Antonovsky's work. In responding to this challenge, we demonstrate the generative possibilities posed by social theory for those seeking to inform and design salutogenically oriented SHPE programmes for children and young people. As such, we first review Antonovsky's theory of salutogenesis to highlight the sociocultural aspects of his model. We then draw on these sociocultural underpinnings to propose additional, alternative approaches to salutogenic research in SHPE, according to the theoretical and methodological tools devised by Michel Foucault [1990. The use of pleasure: The history of sexuality (Vol. 2, R. Hurley, Trans.). New York: Vintage Books]. In conclusion, we propose a schedule of research questions to inspire qualitative endeavours that move beyond privileged biomedical perspectives, to investigate health in terms of how individuals live a good life. In short, we contend that such investigations are best achieved when researchers approach ‘health by stealth’.     

Norms and materialities in physical education and health- ‘I feel that i cannot contribute enough in sport’

Many understandings about norms and norm criticism are based on imaginations of inclusion and exclusion as if values about right and wrong, and acceptable and non-acceptable behaviors belong to a world of relations that can be separated from embodied and physical things and practices. This preparatory study is based on interviews conducted with children with and without varied forms of disabilities. The aim of the study was to investigate how children describe their ability in relation to collaboration, identity, materialities, disability and norms within Physical Education and Health (PEH). The results from this study show that embodied and collaborative goal-oriented practices generate imaginations of community and belonging through a notion of contributing. The results indicate that informing, teaching, and learning about inclusion and exclusion do not naturally produce physical and embodied practices.     

Tinkering through transition: on ‘doctoring’ as an early-career academic in physical education and sport pedagogy

This article addresses the notion of ‘making it’ as an early-career academic in physical education and sport pedagogy. In it, we draw on the tradition of material semiotics to reflect on our shared journeys from doctoral student to beginning scholar and beyond. By attuning ourselves to the relationality, materiality and precariousness of our experiences, we offer an answer to the question of what it takes to ‘make it’ as an early-career academic by advocating the practice of ‘making do’ or ‘doctoring.’ We develop this argument, first, by describing the narrative methods we used to conduct our inquiry and by explaining the material-semiotic ideas we used to explore the stories it generated. Then, we tell tales of our transitions from higher degree research student to early-career academic, focusing specifically on our ongoing, collective efforts to make do. In our discussion, we explore these narratives and attend to three features of our actions and activities as early-career academics; namely semiotic relationality, material heterogeneity and the precarious processes of heterogeneous engineering through which we sought to make a career in our field. We conclude by encouraging beginning scholars in physical education and sport pedagogy to become sensitive to these aspects of their own agency, and to experiment, experience and tinker together in ways that are attentive, inventive, caring and persistent.     

Mission impossible? Reflecting upon the relationship between physical education,youth sport and lifelong participation

It is widely believed that school physical education (PE) is or, at the very least, can (even should) be a crucial vehicle for enhancing young people's engagement with physically active recreation (typically but not exclusively in the form of sport) in their leisure and, in the longer run, over the life-course. Despite the prevalence of such beliefs, there remains a dearth of evidence demonstrating a ‘PE effect’. Indeed, the precise nature of the relationship between PE, youth¹1. Youth is defined as a life-stage that in chronological terms can be very broadly mapped onto the latter teenage years, with some leeway at the upper end to include the post-teen years up to young adulthood. Thus, youth is regarded as a period of transition ranging from roughly 15 to 25 years. For the purposes of this article, the emphasis will be on the latter secondary school years. sport and lifelong participation is seldom explored other than in implicit, often speculative and discursive, ways that simply take-for-granted the positive effects of the former (PE) on the latter (youth and adult participation in sport and physically active recreation). Using largely European studies to frame the issue, this article reflects upon the supposedly ‘causal’ relationship between PE, youth sport and lifelong participation and, in doing so, highlights the inherent problems associated with attempts to identify, characterise and establish a ‘PE effect.’ In the process, the article points to a need for more longitudinal and biographical research exploring sports careers and the sporting habituses of young people, not least in order to better understand in precisely what circumstances PE interventions might work to enhance youth involvement in sport and physical activity and, subsequently, lifelong participation.     

High-performance sport,learning and culture: new horizons for sport pedagogues?

Background: Research in sport coaching and sport pedagogy including studies published in this special issue bring to the fore the relationship between learning and culture in contexts of high-performance sport. This paper acknowledged that how learning, culture and their relationship are conceptualised is a crucial issue for researchers and professionals in high-performance sport.

Purpose and approach: This paper arises from a theoretical analysis of the research studies presented in this special issue. The analysis undertaken focused on the understanding and representation of the concepts of learning and culture and critically examined the methodological application of particular conceptualisations. The intention was to extend insight into both theoretical and methodological issues associated with understanding and researching athlete and coach learning, and high-performance sport settings.

Findings and discussion: This paper identifies tendencies for separatist and reductionist thinking about learning and culture in high-performance sport settings. A relational perspective is identified as critical to extending research and professional practice that is directed towards learning and/or culture. Researchers are urged to avoid identifying either athlete or coach learning (only) with specific events or experiences, and similarly avoid positioning culture as something that sits apart from athletes’ and coaches’ participation and learning in elite sport settings. The dual notions of ‘learning practices as cultural practice’ and ‘cultural practice as pedagogical practice’ are proposed as a basis for holistic thinking about learning and culture in high-performance sport settings. The extent to which such thinking is reflected in the various contributions to the special issue is considered. Attention is then directed to the methodological challenges that researchers face if they are to reflect a conceptualisation of learning as both embedded and embodied in cultural practices. Challenging and extending the underlying vision of learning that researchers, coaches and athletes have is revealed as a critical consideration in regard to research design, data collection and ways in which participants are variously positioned, represented and ‘involved’ in research. Embodied perspectives are identified as particularly worthy of greater attention in contemporary research that seeks to extend understanding of athlete and/or coaches’ learning and lived experiences within and amidst elite sporting cultures. Recent scholarship focusing on the body and lived experience is identified as providing theoretical and methodological insights that can extend future research and practice.

Conclusions: Foregrounding a relational perspective is fundamental to extending the understanding of learning and culture in high-performance sport. Future research also needs to clearly embrace the methodological challenges presented by new conceptualisations.     

Coercion for Asian conquest: Japanese militarism and Korean sport, 1938–45

In the third phase of Japanese colonialism in Korea, from 1937 to 1945, after the Sino-Japanese War in 1937, Japan became a militaristic state. It expanded onto the Asian mainland. Korea was an important military base in this military expansion. The colonial policy shifted from cultural amalgamation to military oppression. This period was the darkest and the most oppressive colonial period. In the line with the new colonial policy, the government closely watched nationalist suspects. It introduced the Regulation for the Observation of Korean Ideologists in 1936 and the Regulation for Detention in Custody in 1941 whilst it also carried out the “Cultural Erasure Policy”. Korean sport was seen as a part of this new colonial policy. Japan used sport to advance its militarism. Thus gymnastics for the Imperial Subject was introduced across society. Furthermore, military drill was performed in schools along with Japanese traditional martial arts.     

Communicating aims and learning goals in physical education: part of a subject for learning?

Based on a socio-cultural perspective on learning, the aim of this article is to examine how aims and learning goals are communicated in physical education (PE) practice. A special focus is on scrutinising how teaching practices are framed in terms of whether and how the aims and learning goals are made explicit or not to students. The aim is also to relate these kinds of communications to different movement cultures. The result shows that many of the students taking part in the study do not understand what they are supposed to learn in PE. However, if the goals are well articulated by teachers, the students are more likely to both understand and be aware of the learning outcomes and what to learn in PE. The opposite is also true. If the goals and objectives are not clarified, students find it difficult to state the learning objectives and know what they are supposed to learn.     

Elementary school students’ naïve conceptions and misconceptions about energy in physical education context

The purpose of this study was to explore and reveal naïve conceptions and misconceptions about energy embedded in elementary school students’ prior knowledge. Students’ performance on standardized knowledge test was used to classify students into low, median and high levels of knowledge about the cardiovascular system. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with students in each group to extract their understanding of energy in relation to food choices, physical activities, and exercises. Analysis of the interview data generated six categories of naïve conceptions and two categories of misconceptions. Different conceptual change theories, including Chi’s ontological change theory, Ohlsson’s resubsumption theory, and enculturation theory were used to analyze and understand these naïve conceptions and misconceptions and why they could be robust to change. The analyses confirm the need to adopt a multi-theoretical approach to the understanding of students’ naïve conceptions and misconceptions (Chinn & Samarapungavan, 2009. Conceptual change-multiple routes, multiple mechanisms: A commentary on Ohlsson. Educational Psychologist, 44(1), 1–10). The findings encourage physical and health educators adopt different strategies to address the potential learning obstacles brought by students’ naïve conceptions and misconceptions.