PE

Pedagogical Practices & Strategies

Principles of Effective Teaching

Good physical education lessons are characterised by principles of effective teaching that define the delivery of lessons in alignment with the goals of the Physical Education Syllabus 2014. These principles, when appropriately applied will positively shape the learning experience of the students. Thus, in a good physical education lesson, students will experience improvement in motor performance through rich affective and cognitive content. They will experience maximum participation in age and developmentally appropriate activities, individually and with others. In addition, enjoyment in physical activities will motivate students to be engaged in the physical education lesson as well as other physical activities beyond school.

The following pedagogical principles are relevant across the learning areas progressing from primary through to pre-university.

1. Plan to achieve specific learning outcomes

· Learning outcomes are consistent with the curriculum and are developmentally appropriate for the learners.

· Each lesson builds on the one before, and taken as a unit, is progressive in nature.

· Learning outcomes and lesson objectives are communicated to the learners.

· Psychomotor, cognitive and affective domains are taken into consideration in the planning.

2. Create a positive and safe learning environment

· The passion for the subject area is transmitted via the tone and non-verbal cues of the teacher. To establish and maintain a positive learning environment, the teacher radiates energy in a physical education lesson and communicates the expectation accurately. Appropriate behaviour and the consequences for inappropriate behaviour are made explicit. These expectations are shared and reinforced consistently.

· The teacher manages the physical safety in terms of the use of facilities, appropriate equipment and adherence to safety protocols. In addition, students gain the awareness to assess and manage risks to themselves and others.

· Students learn in a supportive social and interactive environment in order for all students to experience success and challenge.

3. Develop content for challenge and success

· Developmentally appropriate content in physical education lessons includes refinement, extension and application/assessment tasks to allow the learner to progressively experience success and improvement.

· The teacher modifies the lessons to increase and decrease the difficulty level so that there is a proper level of challenge and success for the learners.

4. Provide maximum practice time

· At least 70% of lesson time is allocated for student’s practice.

5. Employ demonstrations

· Demonstrations must be seen by all students. The teacher should appropriately position himself/herself in relation to the students when carrying out of the demonstrations. Teacher adopts meaningful sequence in the demonstration, e.g., the whole-part-whole approach that involves showing the whole action, followed by the sequence of the action in parts and finally the whole action again.

· Teacher demonstrates at different paces where appropriate (e.g. normal, slow speed). Teacher uses appropriate and accurate verbal cues along with the demonstration to direct student attention.

· Teacher uses student demonstrations where appropriate.

· Demonstrations need to be correct/accurate and positive.

6. Use appropriate teaching strategies

· The teacher adopts appropriate teaching strategies to meet the content goals and objectives as planned. An effective teacher is informed of a repertoire of teaching strategies and plans the use of the appropriate strategy to further the acquisition of skills.

7. Incorporate assessment experiences into instruction

· Assessment is integral to the learning process and provides both learners and teachers information on their progress. This information guides the teachers to provide feedback to the learners and adjust practice tasks to support learning.

· Assessment should be manageable and easily incorporated into class activities as part of teaching and learning.

· The teacher communicates the expectations and objectives prior to the assessment.

· Assessment in determining students’ achievement should be in an authentic context where appropriate.

· There should be a balance between assessing movement process (e.g. movement patterns) and movement outcomes (e.g. successful pass, scoring at goal).

8. Provide individual instruction through observation, analysis and feedback

· Observing from the boundaries of the practice area, the teacher keeps all the students within sight to determine safety, task compliance and characteristics of student performance. The teacher scans the students who are near as well as those further away.

· Teacher moves through the class, paying consistent attention to the various clusters of students in the playing area.

· Teacher constantly scans the students, occasionally providing feedback to students, but not overly involved in helping one individual student over a prolonged period so that he/she does not neglect the performance of the rest.

· In the process of assessing student performance formally, teacher may be guided by a checklist or a set of rubrics. The design and selection of the assessment instrument should ensure that more time is invested in observing, analysing and providing feedback to the learner. The teacher must be familiar with the teaching cues.

· Teacher has a good understanding of the content to provide an accurate analysis of performance.

· Feedback from the teacher involves these elements.

Ø Specific: When teachers provide specific feedback, they use movement prompts or cues that are relevant to the action, e.g., “point your toes”, “bend your knees”. Feedback is congruent to the cues and information that the student is asked to work with.

Ø Constructive: For feedback to be constructive, the teacher has to be positive about the content:

1. Point out what the student did correctly;

2. Present what was incorrect and guide the student to correct it; and

3. Focus on what the student should do to improve the performance and not on what the student did wrong.

Ø Timely: Feedback should be provided consistently and in a timely manner.

To edit on the PE Department TFP click on the URL: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GA3VpyXcXRpoDZh14tuMEMK0JvwU_OTlgdt5bxLSI38/edit#gid=814596757