The Importance Of Social Constructivism In Physical Education

730 Words2 Pages

1. CITATION. What study report is this? Record a complete reference citation.

Azzarito, Laura and Ennis, Catherine D. (2003) ’A Sense of Connection: Toward Social Constructivist Physical Education’, Sport, Education and Society, 8:2, 179-197

2. PURPOSE AND GENERAL RATIONALE. In broad terms what was the purpose of the study, and how did the author(s) make a case for its general importance?

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether social constructivism in two middle schools works. In their own words, the purpose was to “investigate how teachers used social constructivist strategies to encourage student construction of knowledge and meanings, and how students constructed knowledge and meanings in two middle school physical education …show more content…

These “two were selected based on their teaching styles that closely related to “(a) teacher planned interactions; (b) teacher acted as a facilitator; (c) teacher planned high social involvement among students; and (d) teacher used stimulating instructional materials to facilitate students’ learning (e.g. poster, blackboard, projector, video camera, study guides).” (Azzarito & Ennis, 2003, p. 182) Kara had 14 years’ experience teaching physical education, and she also received two awards for teaching the prior year. Julie had five years teaching physical education. She previously taught at a school in a lower-income area and was currently teaching at an upper-middle class school. The other participants were two classrooms comprised of 24 students each. “At Kara’s school the racial/ethnic composition of the student body was: 80% White, 12.7% African American, 5.1% Asian, and 1.8% Hispanic” The 7th grade classroom consisted of “24 students (one African American, one Asian, and 22 White), 12 girls and 12 boys.” (Azzarito & Ennis, 2003, p. 182) Julie’s school consisted of “Eighty-three percent of students were White, 7% African American, 8.7% Asian, and 0.9%. Hispanic.” “Julie’s 8th grade class was composed of 24 students, nine boys (one Asian, eight White) and 15 girls (three African American, 12 White).” (Azzarito & Ennis, 2003, p. 182) The article does not state why these two particular classrooms were selected other than they were students of the teachers that were

Open Document