JOURNAL OF TEACHING IN PHYSICAL EDUCATION, 1995.14.364-371 Q 1995 HUMAN KINETICS PUBLISHERS, INC.

Physical Education Through Students' Eyes and in Students' Voices: Introduction

George Graham Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

In recent years educators have witnessed an increasing emphasis on "education as business." In many states, for example, there is an increasing emphasis on school account- ability. Rather than requiring specific courses to be taught (e.g., 2 years of English) or hours to be completed (e.g., 100 minutes of physical education a week), states are identifying student outcomes to be accomplished and then attempting to hold schools accountable for what students are or are not learning. Schools then have the choice of what courses to offer, and for how long, as they move to "sight-based management" and decide the best ways to accomplish the goals and outcomes established at the state level. Vouchers and charter schools are two other examples of frequently discussed educational innovations that also suggest a business model based on consumer choice and satisfaction. Both of these options would provide alternatives for students who were not satisfied with the school they currently attended. More recently we Americans have seen students referred to as "customers," emphasizing that just like business, education should satisfy its consumers, in this case the youngsters attending school.

Clearly the application of business terminology and practices to education is contro- versial, and I do not necessarily advocate this approach. But the notion of student as customer is an interesting one, especially for a monograph designed to share insights into students' views of a subject taught in most schools in the United States. So let me ask you to put aside the controversy over whether business models should be used in educational settings. Assume that students were customers in the gyms and playgrounds of schools across America. What would they be thinking and saying about their physical education programs? Would they be satisfied consumers, or would they "'take their business" to fitness clubs or after-school programs at the YWCA or a gymnastics or dance studio? How well would our profession be ranked on customer satisfaction surveys?

The fact is that as a profession we just do not know how students feel about physical education programs-what they like, do not like, value, would like to have included or excluded in their programs. If we continue with the business analogy, a business that simply guesses what its customers want is typically not in business long. Businesses are constantly surveying customers to fmd out how they like the products or programs the businesses offer and then redesigning and inventing new products and programs to satisfy the customers. Education, unfortunately, has not been very customer responsive. In fact, if education were the automobile industry, all too many of our students would still be driving 1972 Fords.

Although the purpose of this monograph is to describe and analyze what students think, feel, and know about various aspects of their physical education programs, the criticism

INTRODUCTION 365

of education not being consumer responsive certainly applies to all of education, not only physical education. According to Erickson and Shultz (1992),

Student experience of curriculum has not received much attention recently from educators. Neither in conceptual work, nor in empirical research, nor in the conven- tional wisdom and discourse of practice does the subjective experience of students as they are engaged in learning figure in any central way. (pp. 465-466)

This theme is continually revisited in science, math, reading, and virtually every other subject taught in the schools of America (Alton-Lee & Nuthall, 1990, Ayers, 1989; Mills, 1988; Morine-Dershimer, 1985; Rogers, Penin, & Waller, 1987; Weinstein, 1983). The underlying assumption, of course, is that teachers know and understand the needs and interests of the students they are teaching. But do they?

Recent literature indicates what most competent teachers already know-it is darned hard to truly know and understand the needs of students and even more challenging to present the content to them in interesting and appealing ways. As Weinstein (1983) gently reminds us, "Children's views and adults' views of classroom reality may not necessarily be synonymous" (p. 288). That's true as we know for all adults-parents, ministers, counselors, and teachers.

One might argue that the best teachers truly understand the students they teach. These gifted teachers have an innate ability to "put themselves in students' shoes" and create and implement learning experiences that are truly interesting and beneficial for their students. Clearly, however, not all teachers have the gift of truly understanding the students they teach. And when teachers are unable to do so, it means that the pupils in a class not only may fail to understand the subject being taught but also may fail to understand the value and worth of the content in their lives.

What kinds of things can teachers learn from students about what they teach (the content) and how they teach (the process)? Are truly useful insights gained from listening to students that can inform, and perhaps even change, the way teachers design and deliver their programs? Obviously there is no way to answer those questions for the majority of teachers, but a brief review of several classroom studies, followed by several focused on physical education, will be both informative and a worthwhile prelude to the chapters that follow in this monograph.

Examples From the Related Classroom Literature

A study by Bondy (1990) vividly illustrates the value of understanding how students view the subject being taught by a teacher. In her Cmonth study of first graders Bondy found important differences in the way the low- and high-skilled readers viewed the subject of reading in their lives. The low-skilled readers viewed reading as a subject that was taught in school for an hour or so a day when they had to practice reading, but with virtually no usefulness outside the classroom. The high-skilled readers, in contrast, thought reading was a pleasurable activity that was a useful skill both in and out of school. When the teacher was apprised of the differing views of her children, she changed the way she was teaching the subject in an attempt to highlight the importance and usefulness of learning to read, especially for the less skilled readers.

Another study focused on helping teachers understand how children viewed math (Carpenter, Fennema, Peterson, Chiang, & Loef, 1989). One group of teachers attended a 4-week workshop designed to teach them how children learn and think about math concepts. A control group was made up of teachers who did not attend the workshop. A comparison

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of the students taught by the two groups of teachers one year later revealed that the teachers who attended the workshop were more effective in their instruction.

In addition to understanding how students think about, value, and understand a particular subject taught in schools, it is also valuable for teachers to understand how students from different ethnic backgrounds or abilities view schooling. Cornrnins and Miramontes (1989), for example, conducted a multicase study of four Hispanic bilingual elementary students. They found that the teachers underestimated the abilities of the students in part because of the way the classes were taught. Rather than involving the students as active learners, the teachers often lectured to the students or required them to complete decontexua- lized worksheets that had little or no meaning to the fifth and sixth graders. Comrnins and Miramontes (1989) concluded that "teachers must not only seek a better understanding of their students' strengths but also must look at themselves and assess the ways in which their classroom organization may inhibit or hinder the display of [students'] skills" (p. 469).

Ford (1989) interviewed 57 fifth- and sixth-grade students who were identified as "gifted," asking them how they felt about their school programs and the way they were treated in school. The study revealed that these youngsters generally felt bored, confused, burdened, and distressed in school. These students wanted to be viewed as "normal" and wished that "they were bright enough for school work to be easy for them but not so bright that anyone would notice" (Ford, 1989, p. 132).

Examples From the Related Physical Education Literature

In addition to the studies that provide insights about how students view subjects taught in the classroom, there are also studies that shed light on how students view their physical education classes and programs. In one of the most comprehensive studies, Lawson, Lawson, and Stevens (1982) interviewed 298 elementary school children (K-7) from eight different schools. They asked questions such as "What is the difference between physical education and recess?" "Do you feel better in the classroom or the gym? Why?" and "What are some of the things that you learn in your physical education class?" Two thirds of the students reported that physical education and recess were indeed different. When they were probed during the interviews, however, the two reasons they gave for saying that physical education and recess were different were (a) in physical education class the teachers organized the games (as opposed to the students organizing the games themselves at recess) and (b) in physical education class the students were required to take fitness tests. The authors concluded that "all in all the differences between a program presumed by physical educators to be an instructional school subject, and recess, were blurred in the eyes of students" (Lawson, Lawson, & Stevens, 1982, p. 4).

Luke (1991) also interviewed children about their attitudes toward physical education. She asked 120 K-3 children from 24 schools what they l i i and disliked about their physical education classes. She found that the activities done during the lesson, the equipment used, and the skill focus of the lesson were the top three influences. Interestingly, the behavior of the teacher, the perceived competence of the students, and winning and losing were ranked at the bottom as determinants of the children's attitudes toward physical education. Clearly we need to know more about the programs in these 24 schools to understand why the children felt as they did.

In her often cited studies of boys and girls in middle school physical education classes Griffm (1985) identified participation styles and interaction patterns that occurred in one middle school program over many lessons. Her characterization of boys as "machos, nice guys, invisible players, and wimps" (Griffin, 1984) when involved in competitive team sports and "gymnastics as a girl's thing" (Griffin, 1984) seemed to ring true for

INTRODUCTION 367

many physical educators, even though she did not formally interview the students in her studies. So, too, did the identification of students as "competent bystanders" in another observation study of secondary students in physical education classes (Tousignant & Sieden- top, 1983).

Manross (1994), in a recently compIeted study, also provided some important insights about student's views of physical education. He interviewed fourth and fifth graders from two different physical education programs about how they learned to perform and understand the mechanics of a specific motor skill, the overhand throw. One of the questions he asked during the interviews was "Who taught you to throw?" Table 1 contains the student responses to this question. What is so striking about the responses to these questions is that in the programs Manross labeled as a "skill theme approach" the students' physical education teacher was identified by most of the students as the one who had taught them to throw. In contrast, only one student in the program Manross labeled as a "traditional approach," in which students primarily played large group games, identified the teacher

Table 1 Children's Answers to the Question "Who Taught You to Throw?" p p p p p

Throwing teacher Number

Pendleton (Skill theme approach) Physical education teacher Dad Coaches Brother Previous physical education teacher Other people Neighbor Cousin

Eckland (Traditional approach) Dad Coaches Friends Watching others Brother Don't know Watching ball games No one Sister Family Cousin Myself Physical education teacher

p p p p -

Note. Twenty-five children were interviewed for each approach. The totals equal more than 25 because some children identified more than one individual who taught them to throw. From What Children Think, Feel and Know About the Overhand Throw (p. 124), by M.A. Manross, 1994. Unpublished master's thesis, Virginia Polytechnic Insti- tute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia. Reprinted with permission.

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as teaching the student to throw, even though the teacher in this program reported focusing on throwing in over 100 lessons that year.

Obviously the results of Manross's (1994) study, and the other physical education studies focusing on students in physical education classes, cannot be generalized beyond the programs of these students. Clearly more studies are needed that focus on students' views of physical education, as suggested by Smith (1991) is his article, "Where Is the Child in Physical Education Research?"

The following chapters in this monograph provide additional, valuable insights about students' views of physical education and how teachers can better design and implement programs that truly satisfy students as customers. As is typically the case, however, the theme I will introduce here, and develop in the final chapter, is that we need more of this type of research if we are truly to understand students' views of physical education. Neverthe- less, this is an important beginning. For the f i t time in physical education, an entire research publication is dedicated solely to attempting to understand and explain how students of various ages, in a variety of programs, view various aspects of their physical education programs. We also have the advantage of including some studies that report on how a large number of students view parts of their program, as well as studies that focus on one or two students in physical education classes, thereby providing more in-depth, and hopehlly richer, insights into the complex issue of truly understanding how students of varying abilities, interests, and backgrounds view their physical education programs.

Unfortunately the chapters that follow will not be as positive and complimentary as physical educators might hope. In part this result is due to the students some of the authors chose to study and also apparently due to a number of the physical education programs being unsatisfactory to their customers, the students. One must remember, however, that these studies represent only 16 programs described by over 200 elementary school and 280 middle and high school students (Table 2). The studies are not intended to represent all students in physical education classes in the United States.

Overview of Chapters

This monograph is an interesting mosaic, providing insights into how students in programs throughout the United States view selected parts of their physical education programs. In deciding the order of the chapters for the monograph it seemed best to present them in a chronological order, as that seemed to be the only logical organizer given the range of questions asked and the variety of methodologies used.

This decision was also influenced by the fact that Sanders's study of kindergarten children, the youngest age of students in this study, also provides important insights about how 4 kindergarten children view their first 6 weeks of an organized physical education class. What is it like for 5-year-olds to go to the gym for the first time in their lives? What did they think about their twice weekly 30 minute physical education classes with Mrs. Brooks? How did these children begin to understand the meanings of physical education and what they were expected to do, and not do, during these 30 minutes? And most interestingly how did they begin to understand the difference between play and the structure of a physical education class?

Lee, Carter, and Xiang also had 15 kindergarten children in their sample of 70 elementary school children. They provide insights into how children view competency in physical activity. By comparing the responses of younger children (kindergarten and first grade) to older children (fourth and fifth grade), the authors describe the similarities and differences of these children and their views of what good students are like in physical education classes and how these views change from primary to intermediate grades.

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Table 2 Overview of Studies in this Monograph

No. School(s) Author(s) students Grade level grade level Focus of study

Sanders Kindergarten 1 Elementary Insights into children's initial physical edu- cation experiences

Children's views of competence in physi- cal activity

1 Elementary Lee, Carter, & Yiang

2 Elementary Student's perceptions of PE programs em- phasizing Project Ad- venture curriculum

Student's views and understanding of the physical fitness test- ing program at their schools

Insights of a gifted and a learning dis- abled child about PE and grading prac- tices

Formative assessment and students' percep- tions of effort and skill

Understanding what PE is like for low skilled 6th graders

Learned helplessness as related to PE

Insights into why ado- lescents feel alientated in PE classes

Dyson

Hopple 2 Elementary

1 Middle sch. Nugent & Faucette

Veal & Cam- pagnone

3 Middle sch.

2 Elementary; 1 middle sch.

1 Middle sch. Walling & Martinek

Carlson 105 survey; 8 interview

Middle1 high school

1 Jr. high; 1 middle high school

The concepts advocated by Project Adventure-cooperation, trying hard, challenging oneself-was the underlying theme at the two schools Dyson studied. His nonparticipant observations and focus group interviews of third- and fifth-grade students clearly suggest that these youngsters not only understood the key concepts of Project Adventure, but actually applied them in the activities they did during physical education classes.

In her study of physical fitness, Hopple wanted to discover what students of varying fitness levels knew and understood about the physical fitness tests they took each year.

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Why were the tests given? What was their purpose? How did the youngsters feel about taking them? Clearly her chapter will cause concerned teachers and teacher educators to reflect on the impact of administering fitness tests to fourth and fifth graders and the assumption that children at this age understand the purpose and value of taking these tests.

Middle and high school students are the focus of the remaining chapters as the authors switch from studying elementary aged youngsters to middle school youngsters. In fact the next five chapters might actually be subtitled "What 280 Sixth Graders in 10 Schools Throughout the United States Think, Feel, and Know About Physical Education." Although it was not consciously intended, all of the remaining authors included sixth graders as subjects in their investigations.

Nugent and Faucette provide an in-depth analysis of two sixth graders---one labeled as gifted, the other as learning disabled. In this chapter the two African American girls reveal their feelings and thoughts about the physical education cumculum and the grading practices at their school. Nugent and Faucette describe why the girls felt similarly about grading and bullying in their classes, and differently about locus of control.

Formative assessment is the theme of the chapter by Veal and Compagnone. Although not directly related to grading, this chapter provides an examination of the influence of formative assessment on students' perceptions of their own effort and skill, a topic similar to that discussed by Lee, Carter, and Xiang. This chapter is especially interesting because the authors attempted to see if youngsters' perceptions of their own effort and skill in physical education classes could be influenced by infusing formative assessment into programs at three different skills. In addition to formative assessment, this study also provides additional and important insights into young adolescents' views of their own physical abilities, especially their views of effort or "trying hard."

The chapter by Portman also provides insights into sixth graders' views of effort. Her study of 13 low-skilled youngsters in three different schools reveals how rarely these youngsters experienced success in physical education classes and suggests the onset of learned helplessness in some of the subjects.

Walling and Martinek explore learned helplessness in much greater detail in a case study of one sixth-grade girl. Their poignant profile challenges physical educators to consider the life of youngsters beyond the gym. For some youngsters, simply dressing in clean clothing, eating, and getting to school on time requires such an enormous effort that learning to serve a volleybali, for example, pales in importance.

The themes of meaninglessness, powerlessness, and isolation are continued in Carl- son's chapter. Carlson explores these three themes, suggesting a correlation between low motor skill ability and isolation in physical education classes. She concludes with a model describing the alienation process in the gymnasium.

The final chapter in the monograph attempts to draw meaning from the nine previous studies and suggest implications for both teachers and researchers. Clearly many students in these studies appear to be dissatisfied and even alienated in their physical education classes. Why? Is it because the physical education programs that the students were enrolled in are inferior? Were the teachers bad teachers? Or was there a deliberate, or perhaps unknown, intention by many of the researchers to study alienated and dissatisfied youngsters rather than satisfied and confident students?

In any event, what are the implication for physical education teachers and researchers? Clearly, this monograph does not represent a portrait of satisfied customers of physical education. And yet several of the studies describe programs, or parts of programs, that appear to be having a positive impact on youngsters. What can we learn from both types of programs? What questions will be valuable for researchers to ask in the future? How can physical educators better satisfy and meet the needs of our customers?

INTRODUCTION

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