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Abstract

Physical Education is the most favourite school subject for secondary and high students in the Czech Republic despite being a compulsory subject till their 19 years of age. Still we are persuaded that there exists a group of students who do not like PE. The main goal of the study is to find out whether popularity of PE is reflected in the number of steps performed in lessons. Second aim is to investigate the differences in pupils' attitude towards PE lesson (PEL) with regard to their gender, school level and liking PE. Pupils from secondary (SS) and high schools (HS) completed the questionnaire "Diagnosis of a PE lesson" at the end of PEL and randomly selected 10 pupils in each class monitored their number of steps. Boys who liked more PE manifested significantly more steps/min and had significantly more positive attitude toward PEL. Girls from SS who liked PE performed comparable number of steps as those who did not like PE. However, they demonstrated significantly more positive attitude toward PEL. High school girls preferring PE performed significantly more steps per minute and showed significantly more positive attitude. Popularity of PE is closely and positively associated with performed steps and the attitude toward PE lessons regardless of gender and type of school. In boys (girls, respectively) with age there is increase (decrease, respectively) in average number of steps performed in PEL. Also the popularity of PE is decreasing regardless of gender and type of school; in girls there is bigger drop.

Teachers’ preferences of teaching primary physical education: curriculum preferences

“…60.6% of boys consider physical education "at least" as important as other school subject, compared to 42.6% of girls [24]. Becoming more popular among primary pupils, aged 5 -11 years [25], devaluation of physical education increases as pupils grow [26]. Existing evidence shows that majority of parents consider physical education as important as other academic subjects.…”