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This paper identifies several factors that lie within and external to the teaching act that have an impact on the quality of instruction that students can potentially receive, which in turn has implications for the extent to which students can engage in appropriate practice. These factors all exist on a continuum from limiting to enhancing, and we could hypothesize that they regulate the possibilities for practice that are afforded to students and that this practice time is considered in the development of competent movers in physical education. These factors are contextual, such as time, class size, and teaching resources; curricular, relating to the content and pedagogy of physical education; and instructional, such as teacher effectiveness and content knowledge.

The aim of this paper was to quantify teacher behaviors that were associated with high levels of student involvement and, hence, provide further understanding of student accountability. Two observation instruments were used to collect data from teachers during a secondary school volleyball unit. Results showed that the more effective teacher (as measured by ALT-PE) spent more lesson time in the functional behaviors of concurrent instruction and intervening instruction, whereas the less effective teachers spent more time in noninteractive behaviors such as observing. Furthermore, specific cycles of teaching behaviors that discriminated between the effective and less effective teachers were identified. The results are explained in terms of the development of a successful instructional accountability system being developed by the effective teacher in contrast to the instructional pseudoaccountability of the less effective teachers.

The behavioral ecology model was used to examine tasks and accountability in a secondary school outdoor adventure camp. Similar to results in physical education, the teachers held students strongly accountable for accomplishing managerial tasks, whereas accomplishing instructional tasks saw greater variance of performance outcomes. However, in significant contrast to the school setting, there were high levels of task involvement in the absence of any formal accountability. Although students were not given grades for the camp, many students were fully involved in all instructional tasks. The explanation for this is twofold. First, the nature of instructional tasks was such that ambiguity and risk could be manipulated by students to present an optimal level of challenge. Second, the student social system actually drove the instructional tasks system, whereby the students’ social agenda actually encouraged and supported full participation. The implications for teaching physical education are discussed.

This study examined a sixth-grade physical education class during participation in a speedball unit using the “sport education” model (Siedentop, 1994). In this unit, students took varying roles, including player, coach, referee, scorer, and statistician. The unit was examined using systematic observation and qualitative techniques. Particular attention was placed on the tasks students were expected to complete and the degree of congruence between their actions and the stated task. Also under investigation were the students’ reactions to their differing roles. Quantitative results indicated high levels of student engagement in game play and scrimmage contexts, and particularly high levels of congruent behaviors in the nonplaying roles. Levels of off-task behaviors were minimal throughout. Students reported through questionnaires and interviews that they enjoyed taking administrative roles, and they showed distinct preference for remaining in the same team for the entire season. A strong preference for student coaches over teacher instruction was also reported.

This study examined the participation and perceptions of a cohort of sixth-grade girls as they participated in a season of floor hockey that followed a sport education format. Thirty-five girls and 37 boys completed a 20-lesson season. During the initial skills practice sessions and preseason scrimmages, no significant differences in opportunities to respond (either in rate per minute or percentage of success) were found between the girls and boys. During the formal competition phase, boys had significantly more responses per minute and higher success levels. Nevertheless, the scores for girls during this phase exceeded those of earlier in the season. During interviews following the unit, girls commented that they enjoyed playing on mixed sex teams and taking increasing responsibility for the unit, even though some of the boys tended to dominate decisions and the power roles such as captain and referee.

This study provides an ecological analysis of a sport education season. Through the examination of the tasks and accountability operating in this season, it was determined that the high level of enthusiastic student engagement was due to the presence of three vectors, all of which make positive contributions to sustaining the program of action. These vectors include the teacher’s managerial task system, the student social system, and the content-embedded accountability inherent in the curriculum model. Sport education provides a multidimensional program of action, in contrast to more traditional physical education settings, where teachers either push students through the curriculum with strong external accountability as a way of achieving and sustaining order, or retreat to a curricular zone of safety and negotiate minimum student work for cooperation in the managerial system.

This paper presents a summary of the research on teacher (and preservice teacher) content knowledge within physical education teaching and teacher education. It is organized around the key terms that are predominant in the literature of this field, namely, content knowledge, common content knowledge, and specialized content knowledge. Each of the studies and their key findings are presented within tables. The result is a document that serves as a primer, allowing readers a good understanding of the vocabulary of the field, as well as knowledge of the topics that have been researched to date.

This paper examines the literature within sport pedagogy that addresses early sport specialization. The paper is presented in two sections. First, research on a number of common sense assumptions about early specialization is examined from a pedagogical perspective: (a) Is limiting youths’ experiences to a single sport the best path to elite status? (b) Do early specializers receive better coaching? (c) Do coaches of early specializers have better sport content knowledge? (d) Do coaches of early specializers have better planning behaviors? (e) Do instructional climates differ between specialized and diversified coaching settings? Second, a research agenda from a pedagogical perspective is proposed for answering the questions posed in the first section, as well as the various assessments and protocols that would allow for these questions to be answered.

As the children were having their half time oranges, and the coach was busily organizing the team so that “everyone will be getting a turn,” I noticed one of the players at the back had long hair and an earring. I thought this was quite strange, since the fashion for nine year old boys is more of a prickle cut these days. I didn’t take too much notice as I was more interested in what the coach was saying. Then he mentioned that Natalie would be changing from the forwards to the backs, and it struck me. Yes it was a girl! So much for my stereotype that footy was a boy’s only game.