The purpose was to compare the effects of two practicum types (off campus and on campus) on physical education teacher education (PETE) students' attitudes and perceived competence toward teaching school-aged students with physical disabilities or moderate-severe mental retardation. PETE students, enrolled in a 15-week introductory adapted physical education (APE) course and involved in eight sessions of either off-campus (n = 22) or on-campus (n = 15) practicum experiences, completed Rizzo's (1993a) Physical Educators' Attitudes Toward Teaching Individuals with Disabilities-III (PEATID-III) two times. Analysis of pretest data revealed that groups were equated on gender, experience, attitude, and perceived competence. Kruskal-Wallis ANOVA revealed no significant difference between practicum types on posttest attitude and perceived competence measures. Attitude scores did not differ significantly from pretest to posttest. Perceived competence improved significantly from pretest to posttest under both practicum types. Implications for professional preparation are discussed.

Obligation to exercise appears to be similar for both sexes. Women, however, appear to have higher levels of anxiety regarding how others evaluate their physique than do men. The combination of level of activity and sex do not appear to be associated with social physique anxiety or obligation to exercise.

The purpose of this study was to compare the performance of fundamental gross motor skills by 10 girls and 10 boys, 7 yr. old, with learning disabilities. Their skills were assessed on the Test of Gross Motor Development. The boys achieved significantly higher mean scores than the girls on the subtests of Locomotor Skills and Object Control Skills, and on the Gross Motor Development Quotient.

No abstract

The purpose was to compare children with and without learning disabilities (LD), ages 6–8 years, on midline crossing inhibition (MCI). Participants were 44 children (24 boys and 20 girls) in two groups (LD and non-LD), matched on age and gender. MCI was operationally defined as significantly slower contralateral movement when choice reaction time (CRT) and movement time (MT) performance were examined for ipsilateral, midline, and contralateral tasks with both upper and lower extremities. Participants completed 12 days of tests (30 trials each day) using a protocol developed by Eason and Surburg (1993). A 2 (Group) × 2 (Extremity) × 3 (Direction) repeated measures MANOVA revealed significant difference for each dependent variable. Children with LD displayed MCI, whereas children without LD did not.