Primary physical education, coaches and continuing professional development

Abstract

Physical education (PE) in primary schools has traditionally been taught by qualified primary teachers. More recently, some teaching of PE in primary schools has been undertaken by coaches (mostly football coaches) (Sports coach UK, 2004, 2007a). These coaches hold national governing body awards, but do not hold teaching qualifications. Thus, coaches may not be adequately prepared to teach PE in curriculum time. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the perceptions of a group of community based football coaches working in primary schools of the impact of a Continuing Professional Development (CPD) programme on their ability to undertake 'specified work' to cover PE in primary schools. The programme focused on four areas identified as important to enable coaches to cover specified work: short and medium term planning; pedagogy; knowledge of the curriculum; and reflection. Results showed that for the majority of coaches the CPD programme had made them more aware of the importance of these four areas and had helped to develop their knowledge and ability to put this into practice in covering planning, preparation and assessment time. However, further input is still required to develop coaches' knowledge and understanding in all four areas, but especially their curriculum knowledge, as well as their ability to put these into practice consistently. These findings are discussed in relation to the implications of employing coaches to cover the teaching of PE in primary schools and, if employed, what CPD coaches need to develop the necessary knowledge, skill and understanding for covering specified work in schools.

Who teaches primary physical education? Change and transformation through the eyes of subject leaders

“…While acknowledging the coaches' specific subject knowledge, personal skills and enthusiasm, they were critical of their teaching and classroom management abilities. This chimes with the wider evidence that because they possess weaker pedagogical skills (Blair & Capel, 2013;Ofsted, 2009;Smith 2013) -largely due to their lack of teaching qualifications (Blair & Capel, 2011;Pickup, 2006) -coaches tend to be profoundly limited in relation to teaching styles, behaviour management, and knowledge of both the curriculum and the children themselves (Griggs, 2008(Griggs, , 2010Smith, 2013). …”

“…The SSP policy was not an exception, however. Indeed, it was of a piece with a range of polices since the 1980s which have tended to conflate PE with school sport (Ward & Griggs, 2011) and, in doing so, provided a justification for the use of sports coaches who then compound the issue by prioritising the teaching of sports skills (Blair & Capel, 2011;Ofsted, 2009) while neglecting other elements of NCPE which do not cohere with traditional coaching (rather than teaching) models (Blair & Capel, 2013;Griggs, 2008).…”

“…More recently, however, some teaching of PE in primary schools in England and Wales has been undertaken by sports coaches (Blair & Capel, 2011;Smith, 2013): sports coaches -initially employed in secondary as well as primary schools to deliver extracurricular PE/sporting activities -are, it seems, increasingly likely to deliver National Curriculum PE (NCPE). These coaches tend to possess teaching and coaching qualifications awarded by national governing bodies of sport rather than educational teaching qualifications per se; and are thought as a consequence, to lack basic pedagogical skills (Griggs, 2010).…”

“…The introduction of the Premium occurred in a context in which the 'traditional' model of delivering PE in primary schools -whereby a so-called 'generalist' classroom teacher is responsible for teaching all curriculum subjects to her or his class -has been in place for a century or more, not only in the UK (Blair & Capel, 2011) but worldwide (Tsangaridou, 2012). More recently, however, some teaching of PE in primary schools in England and Wales has been undertaken by sports coaches (Blair & Capel, 2011;Smith, 2013): sports coaches -initially employed in secondary as well as primary schools to deliver extracurricular PE/sporting activities -are, it seems, increasingly likely to deliver National Curriculum PE (NCPE).…”

Reflective Practice in Physical Education and Physical Education Teacher Education: A Review of the Literature Since 1995

“…More specifically, these studies report that participants found it valuable to discuss everyday issues such as assessment, liability and state standards for teaching with other teachers. Blair & Capel (2011) investigated sport coaches teaching primary PE, who participated in a PE CDP program. The authors found that the coaches developed their reflective practice throughout their participation in this program.…”