School Physical Education and Teacher Education

Abstract

Occupational socialisation theory (Templin and Schempp 1989) has helped to facilitate inquiry into the recruitment, education, and careers of physical education (PE) teachers (Richards et al. 2014).When occupational socialisation theory is applied to physical education teacher education (PETE), the need for collaborative practice is apparent.Preservice and inservice teachers, teacher educators, and professional development providers can and should work together to address a multi-faceted professional socialisation challenge.This challenge begins with teacher recruitment and extends to PETE and initial and long-term socialisation in schools, all of which frame teachers' identity development (Richards et al. 2014).The challenge centres on how PE can break the cycle of reproduced programmes, policies, and personnel, given evidence indicating that these result in sub-optimal programmes and outcomes.Teacher socialisation is a mechanism for programmes reproduction, and reproduced programmess promise to maintain inherited patterns of socialisation.This patterned relationship necessitates a dual strategy: Revisit the purposes of PE and revise teacher socialisation mechanisms to fit better programme designs.Questions of purpose invite debate.Acknowledging the dynamic nature of PE over time and across cultures and contexts, in many parts of the world, the preparation of youth for a lifetime of engagement with physical activity can be taken as the current overarching purpose (McEvoy et al. 2015).We begin with the assumption that this overarching purpose of PE paves the way for analyses of the facilitators and challenges associated with teacher socialisation processes.

Topics & Concepts