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Staff

• Ms S. Brodie
• Mr G. Grieve
• Miss S. Herd
• Mr A. McAdam
• Mr M. Sinclair (PT)
• Mr G. Walkinshaw

A Rationale

Physical education is a distinctive kind of education. It is essentially practical in nature and has to be experienced to be understood. It educates in and through the use and knowledge of the body and it’s movement.

It develops physical competence and enables pupils to engage in worthwhile physical activities.

It promotes the benefits of active participation in physical activity throughout life.
Physical education promotes cognitive development in the areas of reasoning, questioning, problem solving and decision making. It also helps develop creative and divergent thinking and requires pupils to apply knowledge of facts and principles in a practical context.

Physical education exerts an influence on the affective development of the pupils. By the nature of it’s activities students are required to work alone, in pairs, in groups and in teams. They have to compete and cooperate, meet challenges and learn how to win and lose properly.

Physical education offers a rich medium through which interpersonal skills and positive attitudes and values can be promoted. The processes and teaching methods that are used, allow pupils not only to take responsibility for their own personal development but encourage them to have a sympathetic, tolerant attitude towards others.

Teaching and Learning

A variety of teaching methods are used in PE. A spectrum of styles bridge the framework of content and learning.The spectrum ranges from command style, through task setting, reciprical teaching and guided discovery to problem solving. The variety of approaches permits a gradual shift of responsibility for learning from teacher to pupils. At one end of the spectrum the students make minimal decisions, while at the other, they not only make decisions about their learning, but they learn to identify and solve the problems.

Differentation

Within each of these several approaches lies the question of differentiation. The adoption of a process model in FE, means that differentiation will be achieved through the pupils performance in the same set of learning experiences. Teachers have to respond appropriately to pupils who, in aiming for the same goals, develop skills and aquire knowledge and understanding at different levels and at different rates. Different forms of class organisation ie working on their own, in pairs, groups and in teams, allow individual differences to be revealed in different ways. The PE teacher must strike a balance between setting work within the competence of the least able in the class, and providing challenging experiences which extend both skilled performance and the capacity for decision making.