“Do PE teachers need a university degree?”
“Do students learn anything important in PE class? Don’t you just teach them how to run around a gym?”
“Students should be focusing on core subjects in school, not playing games.”
“PE class is a time to let students burn off some energy, so just let them play.”
As an experienced physical and health education (PHE) teacher, I have come across a wide range of questions, perspectives, and opinions from others and what they think about the subject area and what it is like, or should be like, to teach in it. To be fair, our field has a checkered history, and it has contributed to some polarizing experiences ranging from a deep-rooted love filled with exciting memories to a gut-wrenching hatred fueled by humiliating and traumatizing experiences. It is no wonder why the conversations range so widely and seemingly take on a life of their own with many shared stories of being traumatized or choosing to skip PE class so they do not have to endure their experiences (of course there is a lot to unpack with these links, but that’s not the point of this blog).
Recently, I was speaking with a family member (not a teacher) who asked me about professional learning and development for teachers. He asked me a question that I thought was self-explanatory: “Why do teachers take part in professional learning? Don’t they have a degree in teaching?” My initial response was a raised eyebrow indicating that the answer was pretty obvious and it was in the question (i.e., to learn and grow as a professional). However, he pressed me further to give more than a raised eyebrow and I replied with, “To grow our understandings and practices so that we can evolve as professionals and as a field.” He followed up with, “Do PE teachers take part in professional learning?” and I gave him a shocked look paired with an “are you serious” feel to it. I knew what was coming and I was right: “Don’t you know the sports already?”
Our conversation carried on in different directions, and after we parted ways I kept reflecting on this idea of professional learning and development and how it sits within the PHE field. Specifically, I wondered:
- how are we evolving from the many approaches that have scarred and traumatized so many students?
- how widespread is this growth?
- how many PHE teachers/teachers teaching PHE have the means and opportunities to grow their professional practice?
- and I wondered where/who the professional learning might come from.
Those who know me understand that these points are especially important to me as a professional teacher and that a big part of my passion in education is to learn with and from others. Throughout my career, I have collaborated and consulted with many education partner organizations at the district, provincial, national, and international levels in pursuit of professional learning for teachers. Through these experiences I felt many highs and lows, wins and losses, and had many agreements and disagreements with others involved, and that was fine (and expected). I always believed that these individuals and groups were focused on professional growth and student learning, and that the differences we shared made us stronger and would help evolve our practices and field. I believed this until I started to see otherwise from a partner group (made up on non-teachers) that I have worked with in my past whose actions and approaches lend itself more to professional regression, or de-evolution, than it does to evolution of teaching and learning in PHE. And this experience, coupled with the family member chat, made me wonder: are we evolving in PHE and who is contributing to this narrative?
Below is a copy/paste email correspondence from the partner group indicated above. Please note I have removed identifiable parts of the email message as I do not believe it is fair to “out” them in a one-sided blog. Rather, I share this message as a cautionary tale to critically question (not blindly accept or reject) the materials presented for professional growth and development, regardless of how well known (or not known) a group might be.
Here is the email message:
“In following up from our conversation. We’re taking note of unique insights from our assessments- such as quotes kids mention to us during assessment and how what they say correlates to their confidence level. In one event, a female student (aged 10) refused to do the running activity sequence of the program. I prompted another description of running there and back and offered her to do it again. To which she responded, “I don’t want to run because everyone is watching.” It’s also worth noting I had two students running at the same time, both refused to run and chose to walk instead at both of my prompts to have them run there and back.
Interesting illustrations on confidence and motivation for sure!
Thanks to yourself and the team for the dialogue and reflections.”
A little context: this message was sent to me to highlight how “easy” it is for someone to assess a student’s level of confidence in a physical activity (in this case, it was a running activity to look at one’s running pattern while running in front of their classmates.) This person was not a teacher; had no prior connection to the students; and showed up to conduct the running pattern assessment (while the teacher was watching as part of the training protocol) with little to no prior instruction for the students.
There is a lot more to this story, and I share this email to highlight the importance of knowing who is delivering professional learning experiences, and what their approaches are based on. In this scenario, I raised several professional flags and strong concerns, such as:
- having students perform physical skills in front of their classmates while they watch on
- not allowing the students to self-assess their skills and confidence levels, but rather having someone they don’t know do it to them
- no form of pre-assessment or front loading for understanding before the assessment
- no understanding about the relationship between test familiarity and performance (in physical testing)
- and many more,
but these points were ignored, and this email (or the story within it) was hailed as a “success story”. I wonder if the students who did not want to run would consider this experience a “success”, or would it be another traumatizing experience in PHE class? I know many of the stories I hear from people about traumatizing experiences in PE have to do with being forced to run in front of their peers in PE class as a major contributing factor to them hating PE, and in many cases, contributing to a dislike of physical activity in general.
Bringing it All Together
In reflecting upon the chat that I had with my family member about why teachers take part in professional learning (i.e., to grow our understandings and practices so we evolve as professionals and as a field) and whether PE teachers take part in it, I know that as a field we do. I believe that we are all on a quest to evolve our practices and our field for the sake of our students (and ourselves too, and there is nothing wrong with that) and sometimes it can be a challenge, or even scary, to know where to look and what to begin shifting. That is a perfect time to reach out to other teachers, connect with a PLN (professional learning network), jump on to social media and search out the many support networks there, and of course look “local” for professional learning opportunities (and by “local” I mean the virtual world, as Covid has connected us in ways that we have not seen before).
There are many ways we can take part in professional learning to grow ourselves, our practices, and our field. Being a critical consumer of information for professional growth is a key trait to ensure we continue to evolve and do not regress to the practices of yesteryear that have produced traumatic “learning” experiences and wide-spread disdain for our field. Do not get me wrong; partner organizations can be tremendously helpful and a great ally in our journey. We just need to be sure we embrace what is right and supportive for our students (all of them, not just some of them) and do all we can to prevent the “success stories” and not repeat the wrongs of yesteryear. After all, that is the essence of professional growth and development: to progress or build upon what was done (or evolve). Our field, and more importantly our students, deserve nothing less.
What type of PD do you take part in to grow your profession? I would love to hear about your journey so please feel free to share.
