Integrating generic and content-specific teaching practices in exploring teaching quality in primary physical education

Abstract

The vast majority of research in physical education (PE) has focused on teaching and teacher effectiveness. Despite the fact that this research strand is fast growing, what effective teaching is and how it contributes to student learning still remains an open issue. Aiming to contribute toward moving the research of effective teaching in the field of PE a step forward, in this paper, we conduct a review of studies on effective PE teaching in primary schools. An examination of this literature suggests that scholars have largely pursued two distinct paths. One group has focused on generic teaching practices, namely teaching behaviors that cut across different subject matters; other scholars have focused on content-specific teaching practices, namely teaching behaviors which are more pertinent to teaching PE. The unique contribution of generic and content-specific teaching practices on student psychomotor learning in primary PE is examined and the potential benefits of integrating these two types of practices in studying teaching quality in PE are discussed. The theoretical, methodological, and practical implications of this review are outlined and suggestions for future research in primary PE are offered.

Investigating preservice classroom teachers’ practices and views about teaching physical education lessons: An exploratory case study

“…Findings from this study indicated that, as far as effective communication and task explicitness are concerned, in the vast majority of their lessons, PCTs provided partially explicit tasks. This finding is in line with other findings indicating that in-service classroom teachers or PE specialists often used partially explicit tasks in the majority of their lessons (Kyriakides, 2016;Siedentop et al, 1994).…”

“…Given that effective task progression requires expertise, good knowledge of the learners and the school context (Rink, 2003; Ward, 2009), these findings are not surprising for preservice teachers during their field placement. Admittedly, task progression, in terms of using all four types of tasks of Rink’s model, is considered a demanding teaching practice even for in-service classroom teachers or PE specialists (Dervent et al, 2018; Kyriakides, 2016; Ward et al, 2018). As pointed out, engaging students in this quartet of tasks demands increased content knowledge by the teacher (Rink, 2003; Ward, 2009).…”

“…Fourth, given that Task Structure System (TSS) is a flexible tool that can be altered to better suit researchers' purposes (Veal and Anderson, 2011), the dimension of the demonstration was added to the original version of the instrument, as it is considered a crucial teaching skill for teaching psychomotor skills (Rink, 2003(Rink, , 2014. This modified version of TSS has been validated in a previous local study (Kyriakides, 2016).…”

Beliefs of Slovenian early childhood educators regarding the implementation of physical education

“…knowledge and experience), their beliefs determine the quality of teaching and care (Strong, 2011). Belief systems influence the way they respond to children (Stipek and Byler, 1997) and thus influence generic and content-specific teaching practices (Kyriakides et al, 2017). Educators’ beliefs in their own efficacy can positively influence a child’s behaviour (Hmelak and Lepicnik Vodopivec, 2015).…”

“…These can hinder early childhood educators to create an educational context that adopts a holistic viewpoint on children’s needs. There has been increasing worldwide attention on the educators’ quality and effectiveness in the professional literature (Han and Neuharth-Pritchett, 2010; Hmelak and Lepicnik Vodopivec, 2015; Kyriakides et al, 2017; Strong, 2011; Wen et al, 2011; Wilcox-Herzog, 2002), as well as on educators’ beliefs about PE in ECEC (Hastie et al, 2016; McEvilly et al, 2015; Stirrup, 2016; Tsangaridou and Genethliou, 2014). McEvilly et al (2017) suggested that it is important to continue investigating the discourses concerning PE in ECEC among practitioners, policy-makers and researchers.…”