This study analyzes a beginning teacher’s experiences of planning and enacting an approach to physical education that prioritizes meaningful experiences. Promoting personally meaningful engagement has been suggested as a key way that physical education teachers can provide students with transformative experiences that will influence their commitment to lifelong physical activity (Ennis, 2017). However, there has been a lack of understanding of how teachers can consistently and intentionally foster meaningful experiences for children in elementary (K-8) physical education.
METHODS: Collaborative self-study of practice methodology was used. Data from a 16-lesson striking/fielding games (e.g., softball, cricket) unit were collected and analyzed, including lesson plans, teacher reflections, critical friend memos, and semi-structured student interviews. Data analysis was inductive and iterative; themes and patterns were generated from the data as they were being collected by the teacher (first author), and her critical friends (second and third authors).
RESULTS AND IMPLICATIONS: Results demonstrate how the teacher came to use the features of meaningful experiences in physical education (i.e., social interaction, fun, challenge, motor competence, personally relevant learning, and delight) in integrated ways to guide her planning and instruction. Through committing to prioritising meaningfulness, the teacher was able to foster these experiences for students primarily through using features of meaningful experiences as a filter for her pedagogical decisions. Reflective journal entries, critical friend interactions, and interviews with students captured how she reconceptualised ways an experience may be meaningful for learners, particularly regarding the role of competition. Further, she came to think of meaning across a spectrum and to understand ways the features of meaningfulness could be experienced by learners in both the short- and long-term. This study provides specific examples of pedagogies and approaches teachers may use to prioritise meaningful experiences in elementary physical education.
• Transformative learning and teaching in physical education and sports pedagogy
