Comparing the Use and Effectiveness of In-Person and Remote Physical Education Delivery during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Background: Physical education is a key component to improve youth health, but there is limited information on physical education delivery in different formats. Purpose: We compared PE formats (in-person versus remote) across evaluation aspects: weekly minutes; perceived effectiveness; and student-to-teacher ratio. Methods: We distributed questionnaires (2020-2021 school year) to school contacts who represented NFL Play 60 FitnessGram® Project (n = 216) schools in multiple US cities. Questionnaires entailed learning format, weekly PE minutes, perceived effectiveness, and student-to-teacher ratio. We used linear mixed models to compare PE formats across evaluation variables. Results: Among 165 schools, 10% (n = 17) offered in-person instruction, 31% (n = 51) offered remote instruction, and 59% offered both (n = 97). Results revealed higher in-person PE minutes (77.2 ± 7.3) compared to remote minutes (67.1 ± 14.6), but results were not significantly different (p = 0.19). School contacts reported significantly more effective in-person PE (4.0) than remote PE (2.8, p < 0.001). In-person PE also had significantly smaller reported student-to-teacher ratio (16.7) compared to remote PE (23.7, p <0 .001). Discussion: Findings indicate PE was offered during the pandemic, but remote learning appeared less effective than in-person PE. Translation to Health Education Practice: Efforts are needed to improve remote PE to reinforce high-quality PE in the future.