What is good Physical Education?

Had a fascinating discussion with a couple of PE teachers the other day regarding the purpose of PE, the aim of PE programs and the validity of assessment and units in PE. As a result of this, I decided to view the website of the major employer of PE teachers in NSW to find out what they believe makes 'a good PE lesson'. It was very interesting. I never realised that ‘learning’ in PE has all but disappeared! There is the word ‘development’ but this seems to be the only link. I suppose one could argue that PE encourages to ‘learn’ to love Physical Activity but key elements included a lifelong positive attitude to Physical Activity, the obligatory ‘fun’ and tasks that everyone can achieve through motor skill development, with this presented as the unarguable ‘truth’ as to why students don’t like PE.

What ever happened to challenging students and creating ‘learning’ as the central platform for the validity of our subject in the school curriculum? I would suggest that such arguments would not be accepted in other KLA’s. Imagine in English only doing texts that students can understand all of the themes in and ‘having fun’ in class as one of the key statements.

It also all depends on how fun is defined, does it not? In my last post I asked what we do with the ‘good’ athletes who are bored! If we cater for them, how fun is it for the others who are not familiar or experienced in the sport. If we don’t, how fun is it for these students? Who defines what is ‘fun’? Is it competitive versions of the sport selected in the program? Is it random game play? What if the loudest students see just playing as fun, should we just allow them to do this? Finally, as we constantly argue for our curriculum time in the race for hours, how strong are these arguments in relation to the importance of our subject (replace 'PE' with 'English' in the statements and see if they stack up)?

I think that 'fun' is generated from learning something as opposed to being a primary aim. Sure, we want our lessons to be engaging but learning must be the primary aim: not all learning experiences are fun, especially when we are pushed beyond our comfort zone. The reward for the teacher and the student from this 'pushing' is much greater than the quick 'hit' of fun.

What do you think? Where does fun sit and when was the last time you asked the students about what was fun and not fun in your lessons? 

Love to hear from you.