The science of physical education

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The science of physical education
Required Anna Lathrop and Nancy Murray, A
discipline under seige who took the physical out
of physical education? Avante, 4 (2), 1998, pp.
92-100. Don Macintosh and David Whitson, The
Reconstruction of the Physical Education
Profession, The Game Planners (Montreal McGill
Queens, 1990), pp. 108-121.
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After WW2The compulsory curriculum

• K-13 (Ontario)
• Initially five periods in each year of high
  school, three PE and two Health, then reduced to
  three PE and one Health.
• Physical education compulsory in universities,
  too.
• Curricular richness wide range of movement
  activities, including apparatus-based. In some
  high schools, military drill and cadet training
  taught until 1957, often by vets
• Gender-segregated instruction in high school
• Rapid expansion of professional teacher
  preparation, with establishment of university
  degree programs

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The growth of degree programs

• Toronto 1940
• Queens 1946
• Western 1947
• Ottawa 1949
• McMaster 1956
• Waterloo 1964
• Windsor 1965
• Laurentian 1967

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Liberalization and growth1968-1977

• Rapid expansion of schools to accommodate baby
  boomers
• Shift from teacher- and subject-centered to
  child-centered pedagogy
• Compulsory requirements reduced
• Optional activities, especially lifelong skills
• Co-ed instruction and activities
• Tremendous growth in after-school sports

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Innovation alongside retreat 1977-1990

• Ontario withdraws minimum requirements average
  Canadian minimum time requirement reduced to 107
  minutes. Hiring of PE specialists declines.
• Many universities turn from pedagogy and teacher
  preparation to kinesiology and exercise sciences

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Kinesiology(AKA Human Kinetics, Kinanthropology)

• Pioneers were Franklin Henry in US Norman Ashton
  (Waterloo) in Canada
• Ambition was to critically study human movement,
  drawing upon all the academic disciplines,
  especially the behavioural, biophysical and
  social sciences
• Energetic debates about purpose and whose
  knowledge counts?
• Encouraged further division and specialization,
  e.g. exercise sciences, recreation and sports
  management, leisure studies

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As a result

• Increasingly
• Faculty drawn from mainstream disciplines reward
  system shifted from teaching to publication
• Physical activity courses reduced or abandoned

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Knowledge has a social context, too

• The Cold War and the arms/space race
• Medicare and the growth of the medical/industrial
  complex
• Competition for funds and status within the
  changing academy
• The shifting political economy of the body
• The turn to high performance in the Canadian
  sport system

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(At U of T)

• Focus of the undergraduate curriculum shifted
  from teacher preparation to discipline-based
  study of sport and physical activity, although a
  preparation for teaching option retained
• Physical activity and leadership programs
  retained but reduced
• After 2000
• Renewed emphasis upon teacher preparation,
  including new Concurrent BPHE/BEd program (2007)
• Strengthened emphasis upon student research
• CCUPEKA accreditation in both physical
  education and kinesiology

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But contributed to the decline of the PE as a
curricular subject

• Ontario withdraws minimum requirements average
  Canadian minimum time requirement reduced to 107
  minutes (1988). Hiring of PE specialists
  declines. Quebec is the only province to retain
  compulsory PE for all grades, and to continue to
  stress the importance of specialists.

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Nevertheless

• Growing social awareness of individual and social
  costs of childhood inactivity
• Canada signs International Charter of Physical
  Education and Sport (1978), which proclaims
  opportunities as a basic human right.
• CAHPER initiates Quality Daily PE (QDPE) with a
  strong focus on physical fitness
• Many school boards develop advanced optional
  courses, e.g. OAC in Physical Education

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The 1990s contradictions grow

• Adult participation in sport drops from 45 in
  1992 to 34 in 1998.
• Participation in physical activity has leveled
  off at about 38 of the population.
• Children are 40 less active than 30 years ago.
• Prevalence of overweight children grows, among
  boys from 15 in 1981 to 35.4 in 1996 and among
  girls from 15 to 29.2.
• Research increasingly demonstrates the health,
  social and economic benefits (let alone pleasure)
  of active physical activity
• And yet, schools do less and less to enhance
  lifelong physical activity, and provide
  opportunities for sports

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Obviously .

• Canada is falling far short in its obligations
  to provide each human being (her or his)
  fundamental right of access to physical education
  and sport opportunities.

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The barriers

• Health and Physical Education is a lower priority
  than other subjects
• Facilities are lacking, inaccessible,
  deteriorating, and/or overcrowded
• There is a shortage of qualified teachers and
  leaders
• Programs are too structured, or too competitive
• Many competing activities/programs
• Disastrous cut backs in the 1990s devastated
  opportunities

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The assault upon public institutions

• Many (most) of these stem from

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In the school

• Reduction in course offerings
• Hartman (1999) found that less than 47 of
  Canadian schools actually teach the required
  curriculum

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In the school

• Reduction in specialist teachers
• the number of physical education specialists
  dropped by 27 from 1998 to 2005
• 68 of schools reported no physical education
  teacher only 18 of schools reported a full-time
  physical education teacher (from 41 in 1998)
• the ratio of students to physical education
  teachers grew to 1185 to 1, well beyond what is
  reasonable and responsible (Data from People for
  Education, 2005-2006 Tracking Report)

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In the school

• A key issue is the narrow definition of the
  classroom, which excludes athletic and music
  facilities, and renders physical education,
  including outdoor education, ineligible for
  provincial funding.

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In the school

• Reduction in co-curricular sports
• OFSSA reported participation dropped by 40
  overall in 2000-2001, as teachers withheld their
  services in response to labour disputes. In some
  boards, e.g. Toronto and Durham, opportunities
  fell by 80.
• In 2001-2002, in response to the governments
  recognition of the importance of co-curricular
  responsibilities in teachers workloads, teachers
  resumed coaching and participation returned to
  87 of previous high.

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In the school

• Deterioration/closing of facilities
• Increase in user fees
• As high as 300 per sport
• 47 of all high school physical education
  programs charge user fees
• Subsidies for students unable to pay were only
  available in 13 of schools
• The top 10 of schools raised the same amount of
  money as the bottom 70 put together.

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In the community

• Inaccessible, decaying facilities
• Shrinking variety of programs
• New and increasing user fees
• 97 of Ontario schools are used by the community
  78 charge for their use in 45 of cases, fees
  went up last year.
• Many municipalities have levied and increased
  user fees for recreation facilities

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Broad social forces

• Reagan revolution
• Backlash to demographic change
• Urban spatial changes
• Information technology revolution

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Forces within our influence

• History of hurtful experiences many people have
  had with physical education and sports

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Forces within our influence

• History of hurtful experiences many people have
  had with physical education and sports
• Tradition of demand-based programming, with a
  masculinist, middle-class, Euro-Canadian bias
• Preoccupation with high-performance
• Invidious competition between sports and physical
  education and the arts

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What is to be done?

• After the awfulizing, after you have taken a dim
  view, what do you do?
• -- Ursula Franklin

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Favourable factors

• Challenging new curriculum
• Growing research findings about the benefits
• Growing fears about the epidemic of obesity
• Growing statements of support
• Canadian Sport Policy 2002
• Physical Activity and Sport Act 2003
• Toronto MOHs Call to Action 2003
• Creation of Ontario Ministry of Health Promotion
  in 2004

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Recent steps forward

• McGuinty Government announces
• New support for accessible community use of
  schools
• New emphasis upon physical education curriculum,
  20 minutes of daily quality physical activity
• New emphasis upon hiring specialists
• New support for provincial sport organizations

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Our strategy must entail

• A struggle to restore and revitalize the public
  sector opportunities
• Forge alliances with others who are pursuing the
  same end, e.g. educators and cultural activists
  in other fields, trade unionists, health workers,
  progressive corporations, progressive police,
  etc.

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Our strategy must entail

• A struggle to restore and revitalize the public
  sector opportunities
• Forge alliances with others who are pursuing the
  same end, e.g. educators and cultural activists
  in other fields, trade unionists, health workers,
  progressive corporations, progressive police,
  etc.
• E.g. People for Education demand that Every
  school in Ontario should have 8. A physical
  education teacher.

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Our strategy must entail

• A struggle to restore and revitalize the public
  sector opportunities
• Recruit the larger ministries of health,
  education and justice

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Our strategy must entail

• A struggle to restore and revitalize the public
  sector opportunities
• Recruit the larger ministries of health,
  education and justice
• A commitment to improve the quality of sport and
  physical education
• A broad range of opportunities
• Equity initiatives
• Quality facilities
• Quality leadership
• No user fees

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Our strategy must entail

• A struggle to restore and revitalize the public
  sector opportunities
• Recruit the larger ministries of health,
  education and justice
• A commitment to improve the quality of sport and
  physical education
• Linking with colleagues in other countries to
  pressure the international governmental bodies
  and NGOS to support physical education and
  health, e.g. The Berlin Agenda

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Questions

• Do you agree with this analysis? In what way can
  it be improved?
• How can faculty and student research contribute
  to the revitalization of physical education?
• What else could faculty and students contribute?
• What social forces might enable/constrain our
  efforts? How would we respond to these forces?