Pedagogical models: Can they make a difference to girls’ in-class physical activity?

Abstract

Background: Research has shown the positive connections between physical activity and health, and physical education has been shown to influence the motivation to participate in physical activities. Student-centred pedagogical models encouraging active learning may be capable of bringing about changes in girls’ physical activity. Objective: The aim of the study was to investigate whether a hybrid pedagogical model could make a difference to adolescent girls’ in-class physical activity levels. Design, setting and method: Sixty-six students aged 13–17 years participated in the study from two Year 9 and two Year 11 classes in three different high schools. All classes experienced the same 12-session hybrid sports education-tactical games learning unit. To objectively measure students’ physical activity, participants wore accelerometers. Results and conclusion: The overall results showed that students spent 39.74% of the class in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA), but girls showed statistically significantly lower scores. While in the role of judge/referee (27.34% of the class), students showed significantly higher levels of sedentary physical activity. Finally, year 11 students showed higher MVPA than Year 9 students. In conclusion, hybrid pedagogical models, per se, may not help girls achieve MVPA scores similar to those of boys. Teachers need to identify the barriers and make necessary changes to achieve this goal. Some ideas for doing so are discussed in the paper.

Could the Hybridization of the SE/TGfU Pedagogical Models Be an Alternative for Learning Sports and Promoting Health? School Context Study

“…It seems that enjoyment in PE classes could be affected by other factors regardless of the model applied. Factors such as class content, motivational climate or the teacher's attitude, among others, could be considered [23,92]. Regarding enjoyment, despite there being no initial differences between the groups, both for boys and girls, the improvements in the values did not provide significant differences between the groups.…”

“…Memmert and Harvey [23] suggested that GP indices should be prioritized for age groups in which the reflective parts of the session can have a strong impact, but that it should always be compared with GI. Only one prior study on hybrid SE/TGfU has considered this issue [22].…”

“…Physical Education (PE) classes could contribute to increasing health and physical activity levels significantly [20][21][22]. However, there are contradictory results on this point because this effect does not always occur [23,24].…”

“…However, some factors can influence students' perception and interfere with the attainment of the benefits of QPE, including gender, age, race, and sociocultural level, among others [43]. In the case of gender, research still shows debatable results [23]. Girls' involvement and perception of their ability could be influenced by the lesson contents [44], kind of sport [43,45], being in single-gender classes or coeducational environments [46,47], and their social and family context [48].…”