Search

Background Movement learning has been thoroughly investigated in the area of motor learning research. Although existing studies have contributed to substantial understanding of motor learning, many have been criticized for their reliance on experimental designs where learning is decontextualized, simplified, and investigated in laboratory settings. Researchers have claimed that motor learning theories emanating from such studies are grounded on a dualistic approach to learning and that the theories are often difficult to apply in educational settings. More pedagogically-inspired studies of movement education have investigated movement learning but the majority of this research has focused on teaching. This focus has left the process of learning somewhat unexplored. There is thus a need for empirical studies that investigate students’ learning processes in educational contexts. Purpose The aim with this study is to explore, analyze and understand how learners develop their movement capability when they are provided opportunities to choose different ways of learning activities. Theory and method We combine Ryle’s and Polanyi’s ideas concerning practical knowledge with Hirst’s and Carlgren’s idea of knowing as familiarity with a landscape. Ryle’s notion of ‘intelligent practice’ is used in thinking of the kinds of actions individuals might engage in. Characterizing features of intelligent practice includes: being sensitive to one’s own actions, changing one’s behaviour as the result of mistakes, and profiting from the examples of others. We understand the development of movement capability as continuously expanding one’s ability to discern nuances and their relationships. This perspective fits well with Polanyi’s notion of focal and subsidiary awareness. Taken together Ryle’s, Polanyi’s, Hirst’s and Carlgren’s notions related to knowing and learning inform our perspective on learning in movement education. Based on this perspective on knowing and learning an action-oriented study was conducted. The researchers created pedagogical modules and collaborated with teachers and university educators to develop learning sequences in line with the needs of their respective groups. With each group, we produced data based on video and field notes. Three successful learners were chosen and followed in-depth with regard to their learning actions. Findings The findings show the learners’ varying ways of exploring a movement landscape as: playing around in the terrain; checking the map; investigating one chosen path; occupying the vantage point; imitating; investigating one chosen path; actively observing. The findings suggest that oscillating between varying kinds of learning actions is an additional characterizing feature of ‘intelligent practice’. Discussion The findings demonstrate how the learning of movement capability could occur when providing opportunities to engage in ‘intelligent practice’ while at the same time directing their focal awareness towards what is most beneficial to them. Opposed to a ‘step-by-step’ approach to learning, the learners come to know a movement landscape as extending one’s capability to discern and differentiate details, nuances and their relationships. The findings suggest that it may be beneficial for learners to get opportunities to oscillate between different kinds of learning actions.

In many countries, assessment for learning (AfL) is recommended in both policy and research as a concept that should be integrated into the teaching of physical education (PE) in schools. AfL is also part of physical education teacher education (PETE) programs in several countries and, consequently, something future PE teachers are expected to practice in their teaching. In a previous study (Tolgfors et al., 2021), we showed how AfL was transmitted and transformed between a university course and a school placement course within Swedish PETE. In the current study, we have more closely followed three of the preservice teachers who took part in our initial study into their first year of PE teaching. The purpose of this follow-up study is thus to explore how AfL is enacted in the induction phase of PE teaching. The more specific research question is: how is AfL enacted in beginning teachers’ PE practices under the contextual conditions provided at the schools where they are employed? The data were generated through Stimulated Recall interviews and follow-up interviews via the online meeting software Zoom. The analysis was based on Braun et al.’s (2011) contextual dimensions of policy enactment and Bernstein’s (1996) pedagogic device. Our findings illustrate how AfL is generally enacted through (1) progression and (2) “rich tasks.” However, the contextual dimensions of each school provide different conditions that either support or hinder the use of AfL in PE. AfL is accordingly enacted in different ways in the induction phase of PE teaching., Funding agency:Swedish Research Council for Sports Science

Research on motor learning frequently reports gender differences. However, there seems to be limited tools in the research with which to make use of these insights in educationally relevant ways. Movement learning and gender are intensely researched in movement education research, but the issues rarely intersect in the literature. The purpose of this article is to shed light on how movement learning and gender norms intersect when students learn to juggle. A pedagogical intervention in two secondary school classes (15–16 year olds) was explored ethnographically. Two composite narratives illustrate how gender norms affected the juggling practise to a different extent in the two classes, indicating that these norms are highly contextual. Learning to juggle seems to include aspects of both ‘doing boy’ and ‘doing girl’, i.e. regarding respectively controlling objects in space and persistent practising. The findings indicate some ways in which teachers can help students transcend traditional gender norms.

Background: In this paper, we will address the question of how physical education teacher education (PETE) matters and suggest one way to explore the potential impact of PETE. A distinguishing feature of the studies of PETE's impact on physical education is that they either include perspectives from preservice teachers involved in PETE courses or perspectives from physical education teachers in schools looking back at their education. Longitudinal attempts to follow preservice teachers’ journey from education to workplace, in order to grasp how they perceive the relation between teacher education and teaching practice in schools, and the transition between these contexts, are few and far between. This gap of knowledge is a missing piece of the puzzle to further develop PETE, and to inform life-long professional development for teachers. Purpose: The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, we develop and present a methodological approach for investigating the transition of content areas from courses in PETE into teaching practice in school physical education. Second, we will illustrate the potential utility of this methodological approach in longitudinal studies by showing how one particular content area, Assessment for Learning (AfL), was investigated through the use of methods and theories described in the first part of this paper. Methodology: The suggested longitudinal approach involves Stimulated Recall (SR) interviews with pre- and postservice teachers, observations and communication with groups of students and teachers through social media. The construction, recontextualisation and realisation of pedagogic discourses regarding content areas are suggested to be analysed through a combination of Bernstein's concept of the pedagogic device and Ball's concept of fabrication. Results and Conclusions: The longitudinal design and the suggested methodology can provide answers to how content areas are transformed in and between PETE and school physical education. A combination of the theoretical perspectives of Bernstein and Ball enables us to say something not only about how pedagogic discourses regarding content areas are constructed, recontextualised and realised in PETE and school physical education, but also about what content areas become in terms of fabrications in the transition between these contexts. To conclude, we argue that the methodological research design can be used to explore different content areas in PETE and that this methodology can contribute to knowledge about how PETE matters for school physical education.

Emotional dimensions of physical education have garnered attention from scholars in the last two decades. Many scholars claim that emotions significantly affect learning and that positive emotions such as joy and pleasure are necessary for continued participation in movement activities beyond the classroom. Much of the existing literature, however, is based on the idea that emotions comprise internal mental states that are retrospectively oriented. In the current paper, we work with alternative principles that can create new understandings of the affective dimensions of PE and specifically, movement learning. We draw on symbolic interactionist principles, framing emotions as multimodal communicative resources that are performed in social contexts. From this perspective, we demonstrate how emotions: (1) can be investigated as part of the production of broader sequences of pedagogical action and (2) relate to issues of knowledge, identity and authority. We present observational material generated with PE teacher education students as they develop movement capability. We focus on three interactional episodes in which fear, joy and resignation are performed by students interacting with either peers or an observing researcher. In each case, we demonstrate how emotions: affiliate or dis-affiliate the actor with the movement knowledge in focus, index an institutionally recognizable identity and influence the subsequent actions of the participants in the interactional sequence. The key thesis developed in the paper is that as symbolic resources, emotions have important consequences for actors within movement learning environments. The paper is concluded with reflections on the implications of the approach for practitioners along with a consideration of questions in need of further scientific attention.

Background Research on physical education (PE) shows a prevalence of narrow and reductionist views on what counts as ability. These views tend to privilege certain students and marginalize others, and often equate ability with technique based sport performance. A lot of research is still directed towards the above problem. However, very few have devoted time and energy to actually resolving this problem. If no alternatives to narrow and reductionist views of ability are presented, then research will struggle to make a difference to the practice of PE. Assuming that movement is a key element in PE, the question of what counts as ability in PE is, we argue, a question of what capabilities a learner needs to develop in order to move in different ways. Investigating what movement capability can mean will provide possibilities for discussing and negotiating the meaning of ability in PE when the learning goal is something other than technique based sport performance. Purpose The aim of this paper is to further advance the knowledge base of what movement capability can mean within the context of PE. By achieving this aim, we intend to challenge narrow views on ability and thereby provide enhanced possibilities for PE to make a difference for students’ abilities through education. Theory and method The process of coming to know something can be seen as exploring, with all senses, a landscape. Exploration involves recognizing details and nuances of the landscape and their relationships to one another. In this investigation we examine what there is to know in the landscape of juggling using Ryle’s and Polanyi’s notions of knowing and learning. In line with a focus on the learners’ perspectives, interviews and observations were conducted with students whilst they were coming to know juggling. Ethnographic-type conversations were used to help students describe what they seemed to know or were aiming to know. Students were invited to write diaries with a focus on their experiences during the learning process, which we hoped could extend our insights regarding the experiential aspects in learning. Findings Findings of the investigation suggest that in the group of students, four significant ways of knowing the landscape of juggling are important: grasping a pattern; grasping a rhythm; preparing for the next throw and catch and navigating one’s position and throwing. The research challenges the narrow view on ability as technique based sport performance by providing examples of what movement capability can mean in terms of knowing a movement landscape alternatively to knowing a specific movement ‘in the right way’.

This review article identifies the conceptual underpinnings of current movement research in physical education. Using a hermeneutic approach, four analogies for movement education are identified: the motor program analogy, the neurobiological systems analogy, the instinctive movement analogy, and the embodied exploration analogy. Three issues related to logical consistency and its relevance for movement education are raised. The first relates to tensions between the analogies and educational policy. The second concerns differences among the four analogies. The third issue relates to the appropriateness of specific analogies for dealing with certain movement contexts. In each case, strategies for improvement are considered. The article concludes with a brief summary, along with reflections on issues that require further attention.

The purpose of this article is to explore physical education (PE) teachers’ content knowledge of the emerging concept movement capability. Interviews with eight PE teachers were conducted, partly using a stimulated recall technique which involved watching and commenting on video recorded PE lessons. A phenomenographic analysis was used to outline the different ways of conceptualizing movement capability. Five different ways of conceptualizing movement capability were identified, which indicates the complexity of the concept movement capability. However, the result also provides a structure for developing a systematic and structured way of conceiving movement capability. In this study we have highlighted a multifaceted, nuanced and differentiated picture of movement capability to see moving as educationally valuable. We conclude by emphasizing that movement capability should not be restricted to only its constitutive parts as teachers’ plan PE teaching, but should be approached as a whole.

There is a substantial body of physical education scholarship focusing on movement learning. The question of how pupils themselves make sense of movement learning has however, largely escaped attention. Answers to such a question would seem to be highly germane if educators are to engage in pupil centered pedagogies. In light of this absence, the aim of this investigation was to describe how movement learners made sense of their own movement development. Drawing on theoretical tenets of Gilbert Ryle (2009. The concept of mind. New York, NY: Routledge) and Michael Polanyi (1969. Knowing and being. Essays by Michael Polanyi . Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press), three cases from an investigation in which movement learning was occurring are presented. The investigation was conducted during a physical education project week with pupils from an upper secondary school. Data were produced using observations, informal interviews, semi-structured interviews, and research diaries as a group of pupils learned to juggle. The results suggest that: the aspects of moving to which learners attend change as they learn; learners have a relatively limited capacity to verbally articulate what they learn, and; learners ’ expectations of ideal ways of moving have considerable impact on how they come to make sense of their own ways of moving. The practical implications of these points are discussed in the final section of the paper.

The aim of this article is to contribute to an articulated language of knowing, which we consider as a key aspect of teachers' professional work. We describe three examples of how the meaning of knowing some specific learning objects can be studied and described. The three learning objects are: to be able to evaluate technical solutions, to be able to perform a house-hop and to be able to act with presence. Phenomenographic analyses of data from the pre-tests carried out within the frame of so called Learning Studies resulted in descriptions of different ways of knowing as well as different aspects of the specific knowns that must be discerned in order to develop the knowing.

Background: A fundamental dimension of school physical education (PE) is arguably movement and movement activities. However, there is a lack of discussion in the context of PE regarding what can be called the capability to move in terms of coordinative abilities, body consciousness and educing bodily senses.Purpose: This article explores and articulates what there is to know, from the mover's perspective, when knowing how to move in specific ways when playing exergames (dance games). Taking different ways of moving as expressing different ways of knowing as a point of departure, the following questions are the focus of this article: (i) How do students move when imitating movements in a dance game, and what different ways of knowing the movements can be described in the student group? (ii) What aspects of the movements are discerned simultaneously through the different ways of knowing the movements? (iii) What aspects seem critical for the students to discern and experience in order to know the movements in as complex a way as possible?Design and analysis: The theoretical point of departure concerns an epistemological perspective on the capability to move as knowing how with no distinction between physical and mental skills, and also knowing as experiencing aspects of something to know. The data in this study comprise video recordings of students playing Nintendo Wii dance games in PE lessons in a compulsory school (for children aged between 7 and 16 years) in a small Swedish town. There were three PE lessons with four different stations, of which one was Nintendo Wii dance games (Just Dance 1 and 2). In total, the videoed material covers three 60-minute PE lessons, recorded during the autumn of 2012 and in which just over twenty students participated. In the study, we have used video observation as a data collection method. Jordan and Henderson maintain that video observation removes the gap between ‘what people say they do and what they, in fact, do’ (51). To conduct a systematic and thorough analysis of how the students experienced the avatar's movements, we looked for moments where all the students and the avatar could be simultaneously observed. Two video sequences were chosen, showing four students imitating two distinct and defined movements which constituted the basis for a phenomenographic analysis.Conclusion: The result of the phenomenographic analysis shows different ways of knowing the movements as well as what aspects are discerned and experienced simultaneously by the students. In other words, these aspects also describe knowing in terms of discerning, discriminating and differentiating aspects of ways of moving. By examining a certain exergame's role ‘as a teacher,' we have emphasized the capability to move, from the mover's perspective, as an intrinsic educational goal of PE while highlighting the need for systematically planning movement education. TV-spel som hälsofostran - om exergaming och ungdomars lärande om kropp, fysisk aktivitet och hälsa

Purpose: The aim of this study is to explore what it means to be able to move in different ways. What does it mean, from the perspective of the learners, to know how to carry out a specific movemen ...

The aim of this paper is to explore and develop ways to describe what there is to know, from the perspective of the one who knows, when knowing how to carry out a complex movement. The paper will challenge the distinction between mental and physical skills, drawing on theories of tacit knowing (Polanyi, 1969), knowing how ( Ryle, 1949 ) and knowing-in-action (Schön, 1991), together with empirical data from the context of elite sport. One assumption is that exploring knowing in movement, in this context, can contribute to developing students’ movement education in physical education (PE). Pole-vaulting provides examples of what there is to know, in terms of embodied capabilities possible to explicate and develop as an educational objective in PE, irrespective of the context of competitive sports. Explicating the knowing (or capabilities) involved in the “capability to move,” as exemplified in this study, could emphasize an educational aim concerning practical knowledge, such as knowing in movement, and not necessarily specific skills related to competitive sport activities.

Purpose: The aim of this article is to show a need for explicating ‘what’ there is to learn in physical education (PE) with a particular focus on learning to move with the meaning potential seen as ...