Conference Agenda

The main aims of this symposium are to introduce members of the UK Physical Education (UKPE) Collaborative and to share some of the findings from their UKPE cross-border learning project.

The UKPE Collaborative consists of a group of researchers from across the four nations of the UK (England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales), all with a shared interested in curriculum, or more specifically, physical education (PE) curricula and the role that curriculum plays in shaping the practices of PE teachers. Relatedly, they are also interested in exploring the mechanisms through which teachers might be encouraged to engage critically with curriculum, and how they develop capacities to re-imagine PE curriculum – what purpose it serves, who it serves and the possibilities for enactment both now and in the future. One of the ideas currently being explored by the UK PE Collaborative in this regard is cross-border curriculum learning. That is, the professional learning potential of cross-curriculum analyses, discussion and debate. The premise is that, by exploring ‘other’ curricula, it is possible to see your own curriculum from a different perspective (Gray, MacIsaac & Harvey, 2018). This then encourages different questions to be asked about curriculum, challenging previously taken-for-granted assumptions about what PE is and who it is for.

The starting point in this endeavor was to carry out a series of cross-border curriculum analyses focusing on the four PE curricula of the UK, namely those in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales (Gray et al., 2021). Through these analyses, dominant discourses within each curriculum have been uncovered and the concept of health has been critically analysed (Gray et al., 2022), as have the pedagogical messages conveyed within each curriculum. Furthermore, the comparative approach adopted has enabled the identification of similarities and differences across curricula, which has stimulated ideas about what PE curricula could be in the future. Following these curriculum analyses, one-to-one interviews with PE teachers (n-11) from across the four nations of the UK were conducted to explore how they understand PE, with some focus on the role of health and well-being within the subject. In addition to this, and aligned with a future-orientated (or perhaps, change-orientated) perspective, the PE teachers were also asked to reflect on the changes they made to their curriculum and practice during the COVID-19 pandemic. Subsequently, a series of teacher workshops was organised, bringing together PE teachers from across the four nations of the UK to share and discuss the findings from the teacher interviews. The two main aims of the workshops were: first, to use these discussions as a form of cross-border learning; and, second, to use this learning to work together to begin to (re)imagine what PE could be.

The three papers presented within the symposium reflect each stage of this research process described above. In Paper 1, researchers will present the key findings from the critical discourse analysis of the health discourses evident within each UK PE curriculum. Paper 2 will then present the findings from the teacher interviews, highlighting teachers’ experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic and changes they made to their curriculum and practice as a result, including a renewed focus on the development of social and emotional competencies. Finally, Paper 3 will describe the teacher workshops and explore the ideas that were produced from the future-orientated co-creation activities that the teachers engaged in as part of these. The symposium will conclude by reflecting on the value of cross-border learning, considering the ways in which this approach might build the capacity of teachers to engage more critically with curriculum and have a greater say in future curriculum developments.

In this paper, we present the findings from our critical analysis of the health discourses evident within physical education (PE) curricula in each UK home nation – England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales (Gray et al., 2022). We carried out a critical discourse analysis of those curriculum documents that talk directly to PE teachers about how to organise, enact and assess PE curricula in schools. The results from our analysis uncovered that, with the exception of the curriculum in England, all PE curricula conceptualise health and wellbeing holistically. However, our analysis also uncovered complex health landscapes within curricula, where discourses move from notions of supporting and enabling pupil health and wellbeing, towards a more concrete (and measurable) concept of health-related learning, often associated with public health goals of promoting physical activity. We conclude by suggesting that PE teachers need to develop a critical understanding of the health discourses evident within their PE curriculum. This will help them to navigate, interpret and enact curriculum in an informed way, enabling them to challenge discourses that are deficit in nature, where pupils are taught how to be healthy, rather than having the freedom to learn about themselves and their health.

Gray, S., Hooper, O., Hardley, S., Sandford, R., Aldous, D., Stirrup, J., Carse, N., & Bryant, A. S. (2022). A health(y) subject? Examining discourses of health in physical education curricula across the UK. British Educational Research Journal. https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.3820

This paper seeks to provide an overview of physical education (PE) teachers’ responses to the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and the changes that they made to their curricula and practice as a result, sharing findings from individual interviews conducted with PE teachers in the wake of this. It was found that – like much of the education system – significant disruption was encountered due to the pandemic. However, the effects of this were seemingly felt more strongly within PE, given the unique nature of the subject in relation to, for example, the subject matter, the learning environments and the nature of interactions within it. Teachers noted how they had to think creatively about how they taught PE in pandemic times, detailing a range of approaches and strategies that they employed when forced to take PE lessons online. Interestingly, it was found that, on returning to in-person lessons, teachers had reoriented their curricula and practice, with a renewed focus on social and emotional learning. Indeed, amongst teachers there was a perceived need to support the development of these capacities due to the detrimental impacts of the pandemic – and associated lockdown measures and restricted social interaction - on pupils. However, despite noting the benefits of a renewed focus on social and emotional learning – for example, enhanced engagement and student enjoyment – there was a desire from many teachers to ‘get back to normal’. Typically, this meant reverting to what might be considered more ‘traditional’ PE lessons focused on skill acquisition and sport performance. As such, this paper asks questions of how we bring about meaningful and sustainable change within PE and how we support PE teachers to think differently about their curriculum and practice to move beyond such ‘business as usual’ approaches.

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In this paper, we present initial findings from our workshops with teachers, exploring the ideas that were produced from the future-orientated co-creation activities that teachers engaged in as part of these. The research to be presented here is in its early stages but will draw on data collected during the two series of workshops conducted with PE teachers from across the UK. These workshops focused on: i) engage in discussions about PE curriculum and practice as across the home nations as a form of cross-border learning and ii) to use this learning to work together to begin to (re)imagine what PE could be in the future. The first workshop provided stimulus for the teachers to think about their own and others’ curricula and practice as well as presenting them with opportunities to discuss their thoughts with other PE teachers from across the home nations of the UK. Following this, participants completed a ‘take home’ task to encouraging them to consider and co-create with their departments what they see as the ‘ideal learner’ in PE. These creations coupled with the initial ideas from the first workshop, were the starting point for the second workshop whereby teachers were asked to consider their conversations to date and how these might encourage more innovative thinking around PE curriculum and practice. Indeed, it was intended that by exploring different curricula and practice, PE teachers might be able to see their own curriculum from a different perspective, perhaps asking different questions about what PE is and who it is for. The focus of this paper, therefore, will be to share and explore how teachers began to think (and think differently) about their own curriculum and practice as a result of the workshops and professional dialogue with other teachers from different home nations of the UK.

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