This document summarizes and discusses a keynote address given by Siedentop in 1989 calling for clearer definitions of content knowledge in physical education. It outlines how at the time, physical education programs were being cut with criticisms over what the field's importance is. Siedentop argues that the study of sport performance should be considered worthy of academic credit and that teacher education programs need to better prepare teachers in physical education content, not just methods, in order to improve school physical education programs.

1. Siedentop, D. (2002). Content
knowledge for physical
education. Journal of
Teaching in Physical
Education, 21, 368-377.
Kathleen Wack and David Robertson

4. Type of, purpose of study/paper,
theoretical framework/background
• Position Statement
• Keynote address for the
C & I Academy Conference
at AAHPERD National Conference Boston 1989

5. Background and significance of study
To put into context, this paper was presented at a time
when:
• Standards based instruction and the development of
standards was hot topic of education
• Time when physical education programs and time for
physical education were being cut
• Major criticisms of what the importance of physical
education is

6. Analysis Methods
• Reviewed historical perspectives on content
knowledge in physical education
• Used these perspectives to support his
opinion

7. Findings/Main arguments
• Calls for a clearer definition of what constitutes
content knowledge in physical education
• Defends that the study of sport performance is
worthy of formal academic credit
• Calls for analysis of our teacher education
programs in order to “fix” school-based physical
education programs

8. QUOTE QUERY ACTIVITY
1. Write your initials on all of the stickers.
2. You will have 4 minutes to walk around the
room to read silently the quotes from the article
posted on the wall.
3. As you walk, place a sticker by the paper.
4. Choose your sticker color by your opinion:
1. Orange if you agree with the quote
2. Green if you disagree with the quote
3. Yellow if you have mixed feelings about the quote.

9. “The content knowledge domain for
physical education…continues to be a
source of serious controversy in our
field.”
(Siedentop, 2002, p. 368)

10. “The teacher preparation programs
today define teaching largely in terms
of the methods, processes, and
procedures of pedagogy with little
attention paid to the subject matter
of school physical education.”
(Vickers, 1987)

11. “If physical education teachers had
any special talent at all, it seemed to
be the ability to teach a broad range
of skills at an introductory level in
environments that promised little
hope of success.”
(Hoffman, 1987)

12. “We have arrived at a point in our
history where we can now prepare
teachers who are pedagogically more
skillful than ever, but who, in many
cases, are so unprepared in the
content areas that they would be
described as “ignorant”.”
(Siedentop, 2002, p. 369)

13. “We all know how completely the
revolution (begun by Henry in 1964)
has transformed our undergraduate
teacher preparation curricula. The
young people…now take courses…in
motor learning, motor control, sport
psychology, sport history, sport
philosophy, exercise physiology,
kinesiology, and biomechanics.”
(Siedentop, 2002, p. 369)

14. “For the physical educator, then,…would be to
insist our students take more courses about
sport and exercise…extend and intensify their
study of sport and exercise by insisting that they
practice sport and exercise—by doing it! We
should insist that our students acquire a range
of movement skills far more extensive than they
would be called upon to teach in the public
school.”
(Locke, 1977)

15. “The subject matter taught in school physical
education programs is not exercise physiology,
biomechanics, and sport history, but volleyball,
gymnastics, swimming and diving….
undergraduate degrees should give principal
attention to performance of skills, not unlike
programs featured in dance or music, where
performance is allowed to take center stage,
unapologetically.”
(Hoffman, 1988)

16. “Some departments have spent a
decade trying to divest themselves of
those embarrassing skills courses.
Graduates with only a narrow, single-sport
specialization, or worse,
graduates without any particular
talent for movement at all, too often
have become the norm rather than
the exception.”
(Locke, 1977)

17. “There is a general belief that sport
performance coursework is not
worthy of academic status.”
(Siedentop, 2002, p. 369)

18. “For these physical education
intellectualists, the value and joy of
activity in and for itself was
insufficient...our attention was subtly
directed away from the crux of the matter;
from the fundamental grounds upon
which this field rests—the activity itself.”
(Kleinman, 1973)

19. “This, then, is the root problem—the direct
study of sport skill and strategy through
experiential learning is not considered to be
of sufficient academic quality to form the
core of an undergraduate degree program.
Learning basketball, volleyball, and
gymnastics—and all the associated issues of
training, technique, performance, and
strategy—are not worthy of academic credit
as the central foci of a pre-professional
program.”
(Siedentop, 2002, p.371)

20. “If (undergraduate PE majors) have increasingly
fewer academic credit hours devoted to
developing expertise in sport forms, they will
fail as teachers of physical education no matter
how well they are eventually prepared in the
pedagogical domain. They will fail because
they have little command of the content they
will need to teach, no ability to take students
beyond that introductory unit that seemingly
gets taught again and again and again. ”
(Siedentop, 2002, p.372)

21. “The purpose and flavor of the
program....says… ‘At Ohio State, we
believe that the best way to become a
performer, choreographer, educator, or
scholar is—TO DANCE!’.”
(Siendentop, 2002, p.376)

22. “Our field would be better off if we all stopped
trying to be all things to all people in our
notions of school curricula and content
knowledge. But before we continue to
criticize school-based physical educators for
their short-term multi-activity programs with
little progression and few real outcomes, we
had best take a hard look at the content
knowledge we have provided for them in our
teacher education programs. ”
(Siendentop, 2002, p.376)

23. What We Took From This Article
• Not much has changed as a profession from
the 1980’s
• So many hands are in the development of a
curriculum at the undergraduate level (To
Dance—To Move—But Wait!)
• Questioning of what is the most important
element of physical education

24. Questions To The Audience
• What has been some challenges to physical
education being an academic discipline such as
English, math, or science?
• Does the study of other areas of physical
education, in fact, take away from activity?
• How can we change the undergraduate PETE
curriculum to ensure students are receiving a
good educational experience?

25. Conclusions/implications for practice
and/or future research
• Standards based instruction
• Standards for Physical Education Teacher
Education
• Undergraduate coursework in physical education
• Name of our discipline- physical education versus
kinesiology
• Scope and sequences for depth of understanding
of activity

26. Questions?