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Effect of a physical education teacher’s disability on high school pupils’ learning and perceptions of teacher competence Lance G. Bryant a and Matthew Curtner-Smith b a Health, Physical Education, and Sport Sciences, Arkansas State University, USA; b Kinesiology, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, USA Background: To date, most of the work done by those who do research in adapted sport pedagogy (a sub-discipline of sport pedagogy focused on modified forms of physical education that address the needs of pupils with disabilities) has focused on the experience of pupils with disabilities and relatively little work has examined the difficulties faced by physical education teachers who themselves have disabilities and teach ‘able-bodied’ pupils. Previous research, conducted in both general education and sport pedagogy settings, indicated that a teacher’s attire, physical appearance, and perceived competence influenced pupils’ perceptions of the teacher’s ability to teach and the degree to which they learned the subject matter. These findings suggest that physical education teachers who have a disability might be in for a particularly difficult time in terms of fighting negative perceptions of their competence and their ability to promote learning among their pupils. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of a physical education teacher’s disability on high school pupils’ learning and perceptions of the teacher’s competence. Participants and setting: Participants were 109 (58 boys, 51 girls) 10th and 11th grade pupils (i.e., years 10 to 13 in British terms) enrolled at two high schools situated in the southeastern United States. The pupils ranged from 14 to 18 years in age and were mainly from middle socio-economic status neighborhoods. Research design: A positivistic research design, with quantitative research methods and techniques, was used during this study aimed at determining pupils’ learning and perceptions of teacher competence. Data collection: Pupils were randomly assigned to view one of two videotaped swimming lessons. Both lessons were identical with one exception. In the first lesson, the teacher taught as an able-bodied teacher (ABL), while in the second she taught from a wheelchair (WCL) giving the impression that she had a physical disability. Directly following the viewing of their assigned lesson, pupils completed an examination on lesson content and a questionnaire asking them about their perceptions of the teacher. Data analysis: Descriptive statistics (means and standard deviations) from the content examination and perception questionnaire were computed for those pupils who watched the WCL and those who observed the ABL. The data were also analyzed using various inferential statistical tests (i.e. 2 Â 2 repeated measures analysis of variance, paired comparison t-tests, and independent t-tests). Findings: Results indicate that pupils who viewed the ABL scored significantly higher on the technique section of the examination than pupils who watched the WCL. There were no significant differences between the perception scores of those pupils who viewed the WCL and the ABL. Conclusions: While the high school pupils in this study had an equally high regard for the teacher regardless of her apparent physical state, they learned less from her about Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy Vol. 14, No. 3, July 2009, pp. 311–322 Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] ISSN 1740-8989 print/ISSN 1742-5786 online # 2009 Association for Physical Education DOI: 10.1080/17408980802225800 http://www.informaworld.com

Effect of a physical education teacher's disability on high school pupils' learning and perceptions of teacher competence

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Page 1: Effect of a physical education teacher's disability on high school pupils' learning and perceptions of teacher competence

Effect of a physical education teacher’s disability on high schoolpupils’ learning and perceptions of teacher competence

Lance G. Bryanta� and Matthew Curtner-Smithb

aHealth, Physical Education, and Sport Sciences, Arkansas State University, USA; bKinesiology,University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, USA

Background: To date, most of the work done by those who do research in adapted sportpedagogy (a sub-discipline of sport pedagogy focused on modified forms of physicaleducation that address the needs of pupils with disabilities) has focused on theexperience of pupils with disabilities and relatively little work has examined thedifficulties faced by physical education teachers who themselves have disabilities andteach ‘able-bodied’ pupils. Previous research, conducted in both general educationand sport pedagogy settings, indicated that a teacher’s attire, physical appearance, andperceived competence influenced pupils’ perceptions of the teacher’s ability to teachand the degree to which they learned the subject matter. These findings suggest thatphysical education teachers who have a disability might be in for a particularlydifficult time in terms of fighting negative perceptions of their competence and theirability to promote learning among their pupils.Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of a physical educationteacher’s disability on high school pupils’ learning and perceptions of the teacher’scompetence.Participants and setting: Participants were 109 (58 boys, 51 girls) 10th and 11th gradepupils (i.e., years 10 to 13 in British terms) enrolled at two high schools situated in thesoutheastern United States. The pupils ranged from 14 to 18 years in age and weremainly from middle socio-economic status neighborhoods.Research design: A positivistic research design, with quantitative research methods andtechniques, was used during this study aimed at determining pupils’ learning andperceptions of teacher competence.Data collection: Pupils were randomly assigned to view one of two videotaped swimminglessons. Both lessons were identical with one exception. In the first lesson, the teachertaught as an able-bodied teacher (ABL), while in the second she taught from awheelchair (WCL) giving the impression that she had a physical disability. Directlyfollowing the viewing of their assigned lesson, pupils completed an examination onlesson content and a questionnaire asking them about their perceptions of the teacher.Data analysis: Descriptive statistics (means and standard deviations) from the contentexamination and perception questionnaire were computed for those pupils whowatched the WCL and those who observed the ABL. The data were also analyzedusing various inferential statistical tests (i.e. 2 � 2 repeated measures analysis ofvariance, paired comparison t-tests, and independent t-tests).Findings: Results indicate that pupils who viewed the ABL scored significantly higher onthe technique section of the examination than pupils who watched the WCL. There wereno significant differences between the perception scores of those pupils who viewed theWCL and the ABL.Conclusions: While the high school pupils in this study had an equally high regard for theteacher regardless of her apparent physical state, they learned less from her about

Physical Education and Sport PedagogyVol. 14, No. 3, July 2009, pp. 311–322

�Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

ISSN 1740-8989 print/ISSN 1742-5786 online

# 2009 Association for Physical EducationDOI: 10.1080/17408980802225800http://www.informaworld.com

Page 2: Effect of a physical education teacher's disability on high school pupils' learning and perceptions of teacher competence

swimming techniques when she appeared to have a disability than when she was able-bodied. Results of this study suggest that as pupils progress through their schooling,their beliefs about physical education teachers with disabilities gradually change for theworse because they are socialized into believing that sport, physical activity, andphysical education are for what appear to be whole and fit bodies.

Keywords: physical education; disability; pupils’ perceptions and learning

There is only a modest amount of research in the sport pedagogy literature that has inves-tigated how a physical educator’s appearance might influence pupils’ learning and theireffectiveness as a teacher. Based on findings in general education settings in the 1970sthat attire, physical appearance, and perceived competence influenced pupils’ perceptionsof teachers’ ability to teach (Chaikin, Gillen, and Derlega 1978; Feshbach and Feshbach1972; Landers and Landers 1973; Molloy 1975), researchers in our field began toexamine the impact of physical educators’ appearance, in terms of body composition, onpupils’ perceptions of teacher competence and learning of subject matter (Dean, Adams,and Comeau 2005; Melville and Maddalozzo 1988; Thomson 1996). Conducted primarilyin secondary school settings, these studies indicated that pupils learned less from obeseteachers than seemingly fit ones and perceived them to be less competent.

The bulk of the research completed by adapted sport pedagogists, to date, has been aimedat both describing and alleviating the difficulties pupils with disabilities face when main-streamed in regular physical education lessons. Consequently, there has been little workfocused on the problems encountered by physical educators who have disabilities andteach ‘able-bodied’ pupils. Extrapolating from the research base on teacher appearancesuggests that physical educators who have a disability may well face a severe challengein terms of combating negative perceptions about their ability to do the job and facilitatepupil learning. The study described in the remainder of this paper was the third of aseries of studies investigating the effectiveness of physical education teachers who havea disability. Its purpose was to examine the effect of a physical education teacher’s disabilityon high school pupils’ learning and perceptions of the teacher’s competence.

Hypotheses and theoretical perspectives

Previous research on the impact of teacher appearance on pupils’ learning has usually notbeen theoretically driven. Therefore, we developed an eclectic theoretical perspective toguide the current study and the other two studies in the series. Initially, we took a criticalperspective. A major goal of this research was to reveal the degree to which physicaleducators with a disability were disadvantaged through no fault of their own and, therefore,ineffective in terms of promoting pupil learning. A second goal was, if necessary, to suggesthow the perceptions and effectiveness of these physical educators could be improved.

Next, we developed two possible but alternate hypotheses which could account for howand why pupils at different stages in their education responded to and learned from physicaleducators with a disability. The first hypothesis was sociological in nature and drew from thework of Bandura (1986, 2002), Oliver (1990), Thomson (1997), Michalko (2002), Gergen andGergen (2003), and Coakley (2007). It suggested that pupils’ beliefs about how physicaleducation teachers should act and what they should look like were socially constructed.Specifically, the hypothesis was that elementary pupils were likely to perceive physicaleducators with disabilities relatively positively and learn more from them because they had

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not yet been subjected tomainstream societal views about physical activity, sport, and the body.These were that physical activity, sport, and physical education were for whole and fit bodies(Coakley 2007). By contrast, high school pupils were likely to view physical educators withdisabilities relatively negatively and learn less from them because they had been socializedinto believing that persons with broken and unfit bodies were inadequate when it came toparticipating in sport and physical activity and, hence, that only able-bodied individualswere capable of teaching physical education (Coakley 2007).

The second hypothesis was psychological/developmental in nature and drew from the workofMartinek and his associates (Martinek 1981;Martinek, Crowe, and Rejeski 1982; Trouilloudet al. 2002),which revealed the impact pupils’ attractiveness had on physical educators’ percep-tions of them and the quality of interactions between teacher and pupils. Specifically, by rever-singMartinek’s ‘Pygmalion effect,’ the hypothesiswas that relativelymature high school pupilswould perceive physical educators with disabilities more positively and learn more from thembecause they had learned to accept physical educatorswith a variety of bodies.Conversely, rela-tively immature elementary pupils would perceive physical educators with disabilities morenegatively and learn less from them because they would not be willing to accept physical edu-cators who did not fit the (able-bodied) model they expected to encounter in their gymnasia.

As middle school was a midway point in pupils’ exposure to societal views and maturation,within the sociological hypothesis, the theory was that middle school pupils would show lessbias against physical educators with a disability than high school pupils but more thanelementary school pupils. By contrast, within the psychological/developmental hypothesis,the theory was that middle school pupils would show more bias against physical educatorswith a disability than high school pupils but less than elementary school pupils.

The findings of the first two studies in the series provided some support for the sociologi-cal explanation of how and why pupils respond to and learn from physical educators with adisability. In the first study (Bryant and Curtner-Smith 2008), a group of elementary pupilswho observed a videotape of a physical education lesson taught by a teacher in a wheelchair(i.e., she gave the appearance of possessing a disability) scored significantly higher on partof an examination of the content taught in the lesson that was concerned with swimmingtechnique than a second group of pupils who watched a videotape of the same teacherteaching the same subject matter without the wheelchair (i.e., she gave the appearance ofbeing able-bodied). In addition, data trends suggested that elementary pupils perceivedthe teacher more positively when she taught from the wheelchair.

The second study (Bryant and Curtner-Smith 2007) was a replication of the first exceptthat middle school pupils were now the participants. Results indicated no significant differ-ences between the content examination and perception scores of those pupils who observedthe teacher when she taught from a wheelchair and when she appeared able-bodied.

The current study was a replication of the previous elementary and middle school studies.The objective was to generate data which would either provide further support for the socio-logical explanation of how and why pupils respond to and learn from physical educationteachers with a disability or refute it.

Method

Participants

Participants were 109 (58 boys, 51 girls) 10th and 11th grade pupils (i.e., years 10 to 13 inBritish terms) enrolled at two high schools situated in two rural towns in the southeastern

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United States. The pupils ranged from 14 to 18 years in age and were mainly from middlesocio-economic status neighborhoods. Some 66% were Caucasian while 33% were AfricanAmerican. All the pupils and their parents consented to take part in the study in congruencewith the author’s institutional review board policy on human subjects.

Lesson videotapes

In congruencewith the design andmethods utilized in the first two studies in the series (Bryantand Curtner-Smith 2007, 2008) and byMelville andMaddalozzo (1988), a 20-minute physicaleducation lesson planwas created containing subject matter appropriate for high school pupils.Because of its technical nature, potential to maintain pupils’ interest, relative uniqueness, andthe expectation that pupils would have low levels of subject matter knowledge and aquaticskill, swimming was chosen as the subject matter for the lesson.1 The goal of the lessonwas to instruct pupils in more advanced techniques and strategies of front crawl. Warm-updrills and practices for the front crawl leg-kick, arm action, body position, breathing, andfull stroke were all described in some detail in the lesson plan. In addition, a ‘closure’ wasdescribed in which pupils were questioned about the strategies and techniques they had justlearned. Finally, key phrases and technical and strategic cues were scripted in the lesson plan.

After much revising of and extensive practice with the lesson plan, a Caucasian femalesport pedagogy graduate student taught the final edition of the lesson in a 25-meter pool tothe same group of 10 pupils on two occasions while being videotaped. As well as being ahigh-class swimmer and an expert in aquatic instruction, the graduate student also playedon her university wheelchair basketball team as the one able-bodied player allowed.

Both swimming lessons were identical with one exception. In the first lesson, the gradu-ate student taught as an able-bodied teacher (able-bodied lesson, ABL) and so walked alongthe side of the pool as she managed, organized pupils and provided them with instruction.However, during the second lesson (wheelchair lesson, WCL), she gave the impression thatshe had a physical disability by teaching from a wheelchair.

Lesson similarity, quality, and credibility

Two expert physical educators viewed and critiqued both videotaped lessons in order toestablish their credibility. One expert was able-bodied and one had a disability. Theexperts agreed that the teacher was believable when she taught the WCL. Moreover, theynoted that the teacher’s instruction was very similar and of a high quality in both lessons.

Three systematic coding systems were also employed to assess lesson similarity interms of type and quality of instruction. Initially, both lessons were coded for the typeand number of major tasks the teacher presented. The percentage of time pupils spentin each of these tasks was also recorded. Next, lessons were coded with the PhysicalEducation Teacher Assessment Instrument (PETAI) (Phillips et al. 1986). Specifically,this computerized instrument was used to code the percentage of time pupils spentengaged in skill learning and the teacher spent in five instructional and five managerial beha-viors. Lastly, both lessons were coded for the percentage of time spent by the teacher andpupils in management and eight reproductive and productive teaching styles described byMosston (1981) by employing the Instrument for Identifying Teaching Styles (IFITS)(see Curtner-Smith et al. 2001).

The results of the coding with the various instruments are provided in Table 1. Theyverify that the lessons were, indeed, virtually identical. The results also indicate that the

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teacher provided high-quality instruction during both lessons. She spent a large proportionof time instructing and a very small proportion of time managing. Importantly, pupils wereengaged in skill learning for a high percentage of time. Congruent with her objectives and inboth lessons, the teacher used four main teaching styles. These were practice, reciprocal,guided discovery, and divergent. Moreover, the majority of the tasks in which the pupilswere engaged were aimed at teaching strategies and techniques.

Procedure

Lesson observation

Pupils were randomly assigned to view the WCL or the ABL. Both lessons were observedsimultaneously within each school by groups of 5 to 24 pupils. The WCL and ABL wereshown in different rooms. Before viewing their assigned lesson, pupils were informed that

Table 1. Percentages of time spent by the teacher and her pupils in variousbehaviors, teaching styles, and tasks during the WCL and ABL.

Instrument WCL ABL

PETAIPlanned presentation 39.71 44.37Response presentation 3.87 2.38Monitoring 46.46 43.07Performance feedback 1.22 1.08Motivational feedback 6.19 6.17Beginning/ending class 0.55 0.00Equipment management 0.33 0.87Organization 1.66 1.95Behavior management 0.00 0.00Total instruction 97.56 97.08Total management 2.44 2.92Engaged skill learning time 50.33 50.27IFITSReproductive StylesStyle A (Command) 0.00 0.00Style B (Practice) 69.57 69.57Style C (Reciprocal) 19.57 17.39Style D (Self-Check) 0.00 0.00Style E (Inclusion) 0.00 0.00Productive StylesStyle F (Guided Discovery) 2.17 4.35Style G (Divergent) 4.35 2.17Style H (Going Beyond) 0.00 0.00Management 4.35 6.52TASK ANALYSISWarm-up 5.92 6.31Leg-Kick 19.50 18.05Arm Action 19.06 15.78Breathing 20.60 18.80Body Position 12.89 15.45Full Stroke 15.20 15.67Closure 6.83 9.94

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they would be asked to complete a short examination over the material covered in the lessonimmediately following its conclusion. In addition, they were told that they would also begiven a short questionnaire about the instructor who taught the lesson. Finally, pupilswere assured that the examinations and questionnaires would be kept anonymous.

Content examination

Pupils were asked to complete a short written examination over the techniques and strat-egies taught by the instructor (see Appendix 1) immediately following the observation oftheir assigned lesson. Three sport pedagogy experts evaluated the examination and declaredit to have good content validity. The format of the examination was similar to that utilizedby Melville and Maddalozzo (1988) and Bryant and Curtner-Smith (2007, 2008). Itincluded 12 multiple-choice questions, six of which were related to swimming techniquesand six of which were related to swimming strategies. Scoring the examination involvedrecording the number of correct responses for technique questions, the number of correctresponses for strategy questions, and the number of correct responses in total.

Perception questionnaire

Pupils were asked to complete a short questionnaire in order to ascertain their (a) liking forthe teacher, (b) perceptions of the teacher’s mastery of content, and (c) perceptions of thedegree to which the teacher was a positive role model (see Appendix 2) directly after fin-ishing the content examination. The three experts also believed the questionnaire to havehigh content validity. The questionnaire was similar, in terms of design, to the one utilizedby Melville and Maddalozzo (1988) and Bryant and Curtner-Smith (2007, 2008). It con-tained a total of six statements, two related to the pupils’ liking for the teacher, tworelated to the pupils’ perceptions of the teacher’s competency, and two related to thedegree to which the pupils thought the teacher was a positive role model. Pupils evaluatedthese statements on a Likert-type scale. They could strongly agree (scored 5), agree (scored4), indicate they were uncertain (scored 3), disagree (scored 2), or strongly disagree (scored1) with each statement. The five possible responses to each statement were depicted withpictures of facial expressions in order to assist the pupils in their choice of answer.Scoring of the questionnaires involved summing the responses to the two statements onliking the teacher, content mastery, and role modeling. Each questionnaire, therefore,yielded three scores ranging from 2 to 10.

Reading level of the content examination and perception questionnaire

The Flesch Reading Ease test (Flesch 1951) and the Flesch-Kincaid Reading Level test(Kincaid et al. 1975) were used to evaluate the reading level of the content examinationand perception questionnaire. The Flesch Reading Ease test assesses text on a 100-pointscale. The lower the score, the harder the text is to understand. The Flesch-KincaidReading Level test arrives at the United States school grade level for which text is appro-priate. These evaluations produced a Flesch reading ease score of 74.4 and a Flesch-Kincaidgrade-level score of 5.0 for the content examination, and a Flesch reading ease score of 73.6and a Flesch-Kincaid grade-level score of 5.4 for the perception questionnaire. Based onthese scores, the assumption was that the 10th and 11th grade pupils in the study wouldbe capable of reading and comprehending the two documents.

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Data analysis

Content examination

Descriptive statistics (means and standard deviations) across all 12 questions were com-puted for those pupils who watched the WCL and those who observed the ABL. Descrip-tive statistics were also computed for the WCL and ABL groups across the six questionsabout swimming techniques and the six questions about swimming strategies. To findout whether pupils learned more or less about swimming in general and strategies and tech-niques of swimming when observing the WCL or ABL, a 2 � 2 (teacher disability level xcontent area) repeated measures analysis of variance test was employed, with paired com-parison t-test follow-ups, if necessary, in which the Bonferroni method was used to controlfor multiple comparisons. As this was the third study in an exploratory line of research, incongruence with Henkel (1976), the level of significance for this inferential statistical test aswell as others in the study was established at p , .10.

Perception questionnaire data

Descriptive statistics (means and standard deviations) were computed for each of the threecategories on the questionnaire for the WCL and ABL groups. Independent t-tests, forwhich the Bonferroni method was, again, utilized to control for multiple comparisonswere then computed to discover whether there were significant differences between theperceptions of pupils who observed the WCL and the ABL.

Results

Content examination

Table 2 shows the descriptive data for the content examination descriptive. The tablereveals that, regardless of whether the pupils viewed the WCL or ABL, their performancewas fairly mediocre both on the test as a whole and within the two content areas (i.e.,techniques and strategies) of the test.

Results of the analysis of variance test revealed no significant main effects for teacherdisability level [F (1, 107) ¼ 2.16, p ¼ .145] or content area [F (1, 107) ¼ .299, p ¼ .586]

Table 2. Scores on the content examination and perception questionnaire by pupils whoviewed the WCL and ABL.

Group

WCL ABL

M SD M SD

Content ExaminationGrand Scorea 6.36 2.23 6.98 2.15Technique Scoreb 3.02 1.16 3.57 1.29Strategic Scorec 3.35 1.37 3.41 1.49Perception Questionnaired

Liking for the Teacher 7.81 1.63 7.29 1.88Mastery of Content 7.56 1.66 7.18 1.68Positive Role Model 6.41 2.09 6.25 2.10

Notes: apossible 12 points; bpossible 6 points; cpossible 6 points; dLikert scale (stronglyagree – 5, strongly disagree – 1).

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alone. However, the results revealed a significant interaction between the teacher disabilitylevel and the content area [F (1, 107) ¼ 2.83, p ¼ .096]. Inspection of Figure 1 reveals thatthis interactionwas due to the different impact of teacher disability level on technique and strat-egy scores. The paired comparison t-test follow-up analyses revealed that pupils who viewedthe ABL scored significantly higher on the technique portion of the examination than pupilswho watched the WCL (p ¼ .020). Conversely, there was no significant difference betweenthe strategy scores of pupils who viewed either lesson. In addition, pupils who viewed theABL scored significantly higher on the technique questions than they did on the strategy ques-tions (p ¼ .054).

Perception questionnaire

Table 2 also shows the descriptive data for the perception questionnaire. These data revealthat pupils in the WCL and ABL groups liked the teacher, thought the teacher had goodmastery of content, and believed that the teacher was a good role model. The independentt-tests indicated that perceptions of the teacher by pupils in either group did not differsignificantly.

Discussion

The most important result of this study was that while the high school pupils in it had anequally high regard for the teacher regardless of her apparent physical state, they learnedless from her about swimming techniques when she appeared to have a disability thanwhen she was able-bodied. These findings, then, are discouraging in that they suggestthat the pupils were negatively influenced by the teacher’s apparent disability.

Moreover, and equally worrying, these findings are congruent with those from the studiesinvestigating the effect of physical education teachers’ apparent fitness on secondarypupils’ learning and perceptions of teacher ability (Dean, Adams, and Comeau 2005; Mel-ville and Maddalozzo 1988; Thomson 1996). Recall that this line of research suggested

Figure 1. Scores on the content examination by pupils who viewed the WCL and ABL.

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that, even though they were equally skilled in terms of pedagogical behavior, teachers whoappeared to be unfit and overweight had a negative impact on their pupils when comparedwith teachers who were apparently fit and trim.

When compared with the first two studies in the series (Bryant and Curtner-Smith 2007,2008), which were virtually identical to the present study except that participants wereelementary and middle school pupils, the results of the current study provide more evidencein support of the sociological explanation of how and why pupils of different ages learn fromand respond to physical educators who possess disabilities. Recall that the elementary pupilsin the initial study of the series (Bryant and Curtner-Smith 2008) learned significantly morefrom the teacher when she was in a wheelchair, while learning among the middle schoolpupils in the second study (Bryant and Curtner-Smith 2007) was similar regardless ofwhether they watched the WCL or the ABL. In contrast, in the present study, pupils whowatched the ABL learned significantly more about the techniques of swimming than pupilswho watched the WCL. Collectively, these results suggest that as pupils progress throughtheir schooling, their beliefs about physical education teachers with disabilities graduallychange for the worse because they are socialized into believing that sport, physical activity,and physical education are for what appear to be whole and fit bodies.

This conclusion is made tentatively and needs more support from similar series of cross-sectional studies and, obviously, studies which yield longitudinal data before it can be madewith more confidence. In addition, and as we have noted before (Bryant and Curtner-Smith2008), future research in this line should also seek to discover whether or not there is aninteraction between teachers’ possession of disabilities and factors such as gender, culture,and lesson content. Furthermore, and as we have also suggested previously (Bryant andCurtner-Smith 2008), researchers could also investigate the influence of different disabilitiesof varying severity on pupils’ learning and perceptions of teacher competence and employqualitative methods, especially those which might reveal the thinking of children andyouth such as stimulated recall, to gather data as pupils are taught by or observe physicaleducation teachers with disabilities. Finally, of course, if the findings of studies continue tobe of a similar pattern, researchers need to take on a more radical critical perspective andseek to find interventions which improve the perceptions and, hence, effectiveness of thehighly skilled but apparently marginalized physical education teacher with a disability.

Note

1. Swimming was not part of the school district’s physical education curriculum, outside agenciesproviding opportunities for swimming instruction were relatively rare, and the state in which thestudy took place had one of the highest proportions of non-swimmers and rates of death bydrowning in the United States.

References

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Appendix 1. Swimming questions

Please Circle

Your Sex: M FYour Grade: 10th 11thYour Age: 15 16 17

Please Circle the Correct Answer from the Videotape1. Good body alignment in the front crawl increases?

a) Efficiency b) Drag in the water c) Recovery time d) Energy expenditure

2. The main propulsive force in the front crawl comes from your?a) Legs b) Arms c) Feet d) Abdominal muscles

3. Crossing the midline of your body in the front crawl stroke causes you to?a) Expend too much energy b) Move left & right in the water c) Slow down d) All of the above

4. Using alternate breathing patterns in the front crawl, means to?a) Only breath when necessary b) Breath on both your left & right side c) Lifting your head out ofthe water to breath d) Take a breath every 10 strokes

5. The body position in the front crawl should be?a) Vertical & streamlined b) Horizontal & streamlined c) Plantar-flexed d) Dorsi-flexed

6. Body roll in the front crawl means?a) Performing a flip turn at the wall b) Flipping over on your back c) Turning your head left &right d) Rotating movement around your midline

7. When swimming the front crawl, you can save energy by?a) Breathing more often b) Breathing less often c) Fast arm strokes d) Slow arm strokes

8. You can swim a longer distance if you?a) Relax with slow arm and leg movement b) Get a good nights sleep c) Kick hard d) Breath more

9. To help increase your speed in racing, you can?a) Wear a swim cap b) Take less breaths c) Take more breaths d) Kick really hard

10. By incorporating alternate breathing patterns in the freestyle, you will?a) Take calm and relaxed breaths b) See both sides of the pool c) Not get a sore neck d) a, b, & c

11. Stretching your arm forward during the stroke and maintaining body roll, you will?a) Have efficient strokes b) Stay straight c) Keep your whole body on the surface d) a, b, & c

12. Slow ‘warm up’ swimming before racing will help you?a) Sleep well b) Give you an advantage c) Prevent cramps and injury d) Get noticed by the coach

Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy 321

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Appendix 2. Video questionnaire

Please Circle

Your Sex: M FYour Grade: 10th 11thYour Age: 15 16 17

After viewing today’s video,please check the mostappropriate response.

1. I liked the PE teacherwho taught swimmingin the video.

2. I liked how the PE teacher inthe video taught swimming.

3. The PE teacher in the videoknows a lot about swimming.

4. The PE teacher in the videois a swimming expert.

5. The PE teacher in the videomakes me feel like swimming.

6. The PE teacher in the videomakes me want to improvemy swimming.

322 L.G. Bryant and M. Curtner-Smith