The Visual in Sport History: Approaches,Methodologies and Sources

Historians of sport now increasingly accept that visual inquiry offers another dimension to social and cultural research into sport and its history. It is complex and its boundaries are rapidly evolving. This overview offers a justification for placing more emphasis on visual approaches and an introduction to the study and interpretation of visual culture in relation to the history of sport. It stresses the importance of adopting a critical approach and the need to be reflective about that critique. An ever-widening range of visual data are now being explored; so, this paper begins with a brief survey of sources that potentially offer rich returns, from film and photographs to posters and paintings or standards and statues. It next provides a critical assessment at an introductory level of some of the more important methodologies now emerging to help interpret these. This can be no more than a personal choice, given their sheer variety and interdisciplinary nature, and the reality that many historians of sport adopt a mixture of methods and approaches. Approaches covered include content analysis, iconography and iconology, semiology, psychoanalysis, discourse analysis, and reception and audience studies. Examples of recent studies of visual studies are used to illustrate the discussion.     

Curriculum Continuity and Transfer from Primary to Secondary School: the case of history

The transfer of children from primary school to secondary school has long been seen as a problematic area. The National Curriculum was depicted as offering a solution to some of the transfer problems by providing for curriculum continuity across the primary-secondary divide. This paper reports the results of a study of curriculum continuity in one subject, history, now that a National Curriculum has been in place for several years. It reports that teachers continue to see problems with the transfer and that secondary school teachers still incline to a ‘fresh start’ approach to year 7 pupils. There is also some evidence of a lack of curriculum consistency within the secondary schools involved in the research, there are differences between primary and secondary schools in the range of teaching and learning methods employed, there is some decline in pupils’ ratings of their experience of secondary education across year 7 and there are signs of some gender differences in these ratings. The conclusion is that there is a case for saying that the new arrangements have not alleviated the problems associated with the transfer.     

Impact of sustained professional development in STEM on outcome measures in a diverse urban district

Sustained professional development can support STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) reform. The authors describe a 3-year study of sustained professional development for 3 diverse urban schools across the salient factors of fidelity of implementation of project-based learning, development of professional learning communities, and student achievement. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected. The students who experienced the greatest fidelity of implementation exhibited the greatest gains (d = 1.41–2.03) on standardized test scores, while those with the lowest fidelity of implementation exhibited negative gains (d = –0.16 to –0.08). Qualitative data indicated teachers perceived there were multiple benefits from the implementation of project-based learning.     

Social stratification and life chances: An interactive learning strategy for criminal justice classes

Social class is an important issue that must be taken into consideration when examining crime and criminal behavior in the United States. Social class is often viewed as a critical factor that influences the motivation to commit criminal activities. This article describes an interactive exercise that helps students better understand how social class may influence deviant and/or criminal behavior as a response to wanting to maintain status quo (particularly those in middle to upper class levels), economic hardships (that may occur at various class levels), the lack of social power, income inequality, or the lack of resources.     

Sports Gambling during the Second World War: A British Entertainment for Critical Times or a National Evil?

The catastrophe of the Second World War had a significant effect on British social and economic life, with less leisure and more time and energy spent on the war effort, yet sports betting survived. The paper begins by examining the arguments strongly advanced by vociferous anti-betting groups in the first years after the outbreak of war, and assesses their limited success. Assessments of betting turnover suggest an initial decline in betting, largely perhaps because of the brief curtailment of horse racing, dog racing, and football, the three principal betting media. The paper explores some of the reasons why it then once more increased, according to the surveys of the Churches Committee on Gambling or Mass Observation. The argument focuses on provision and betting organization: the continued legal opportunities within Britain, including new ‘unity’ football pools, the reopening of some English racecourses and dog-tracks, and the new opportunities created by illegal ready-money bookmakers, such as Irish horse-racing results, which were unaffected by the war. The national government took the view that the betting sports were ‘entertainments’ and ‘in the public interest’, and also helped by providing scarce petrol to assist with the movement of horses and dogs to meetings.