Gender and Physical Education: Contemporary Issues and Future Directions

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Send me a copy Cancel. Request Permissions View permissions information for this article. Keywords discourse , gender , physical education , teacher. Remember me Forgotten your password? Subscribe to this journal. Vol 11, Issue 3, Contesting discourses about physical education. Tips on citation download. Tinning eds Physical Education, Curriculum and Culture: Critical Issues in the Contemporary Crisis, pp.

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Gender and Physical Education: Contemporary Issues and Future Directions, pp. London and New York: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York and London: Poststructural Investigations in Education. Sexuality and Physical Education' , in D. Gender and Physical Education. Contemporary Issues and Future directions, pp. Sport, Bodies, Gender' , in S. Flintoff eds Gender and Sport: Flickor och pojkar om kvinnligt och manligt i relation till kropp, idrott, familj och arbete The Young Constructors. Crisis of Challenge' , Physical Education Review 13 2: Essays on Theory and Practice.

Power, Knowledge and Discourse' , in M. Life and Learning in Swedish Grammar Schools — Bringing the Hidden Curriculum into View' , Quest School Practice and Public Discourse — A Gendered History' , in D. The Sociology of Sport and Physical Education: An Introductory Reader, pp. Wright eds Body Knowledge and Control: Studies in the Sociology of Physical Education and Health, pp. En nutidshistoria om idrottsmannen och idrottskvinnan Gender Staging in Sport: The answers were then categorized by topic and the sex of respondent, culminating in a systematic comparison between the groups.

The results were described and analyzed in two broad categories, aiming to facilitate the understanding of the data regarding the students' practice inside and outside of the phys ical education classes. The first category comprises a discussion regarding the relations established by boys and girls towards physical activity practices, establishing a parallel relation with historical and cultural aspects.

The second category was struc tured under a gender perspective and presented an analysis of the physical education classes from the students' point of view, including the three main points of the study: This organization was adopted taking into consideration the results obtained throughout the research, once the characteris tics of the participant groups were very diverse regarding both gender issues and the relations established inside and outside the scope of the school. This category investigated the data concerning the com prehension of physical activities performed by boys and girls outside the daily school routine, once the intentions and cultural inferences that rule the practices performed outside the physical education classes are discrepant.

The results showed that most participants perform one type of physical activity outside of the physical education classes. Out of the subjects, It is important to highlight that the point was exclusively considered whether or not the participants performed an extra-school activity; not the time dedicated to such practice. Studies have demonstrated that high school students show a lower level of adherence regarding physical activities when compared with other age groups Hallal et al.

This wide range of percentage variation is an important confounder factor in the analysis of this particular population. This study included , students enrolled in the 9th year of fundamental school, the year that immediately precedes high school in Brazil. Among several other factors investigated, the PeNSE - demonstrated that the national average of students performing any physical activity without administrative dependence of school was of The data obtained in this study point that This scenario suggests that disliking physical activities is not a reason why high school students do not participate in the classes, once they perform these activities in other spaces.

A hypothesis to explain the dissent found between the need of the students to perform physical activities and their distance from the physical education classes can be associated with the premise that this discipline, in general, is not attractive to the students. Therefore, this curricular component is of extreme relevance in the formation of the young students with regard to health and physical education issues. Moreover, the practice of phys ical exercises in the period of adolescence is very beneficial, preventing the risk factors of some chronic diseases Hallal et al.

When these data are separately analyzed under the per spective of gender, more concerning differences are observed, corroborating the distance of the girls in relation to physical activities. Morevoer, international studies also found a greater distance of girls from different age groups regarding physical activities Caspersen et al. These factors can be associated with the social and cultural contexts to which boys and girls are exposed from birth to adult life, once there are behaviors, characteristics and preferences historically considered suitable for each gender.

In our society, girls playing with dolls is considered a natural behavior, in addition to being very encouraged by the parents. This data shows the cultural influence associated with these practices in determining what social behavior is expected from each gender, through the social representations reflected on the play activities.

The street games showed high percentages in both groups; however, some differences were observed, especially regarding the type of activity. For example, the girls mentioned activities tradicionally linked to the female childhood universe, such as hopscotch, "button, button, who's got the button?

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Game play bears relation to the social "feminine" and "masculine" roles, replicating the position each gender will socially occupy in adulthood. When these social constructions are not debated in educa tional settings, they may be interiorized, normatized and even tually naturalized. Another important point to be observed refers to the analysis of data presented by the boys. This analysis shows that the individuals of this group have practiced different activities since childhood, demonstrating a richer and broader exploration of motor experiences in comparison with the girls. The cultural seperation of the girls in relation to some bodily practices can be associated with the little prevalence of this group in physical activities during adolescence and posteriorly in adult life.

This can be explained by the lack of opportunities offered to this group to explore motor challenges, which makes the girls less skillful and consenquently less motivated to prac tice physical activities Daolio, Why cannot girls play with toy cars, play soccer, practice skateboarding or fighting?

Are their organisms unsuitable to perform tasks culturally established as manly? These questions disregard the historical gender construction and extrapolate physiological and biological dimensions.

Gender and Physical Education: Contemporary Issues and Future Directions

Daolio, reports an example extracted from his teaching practice, in which, during a mixed-sex vol leyball game, after a reception error asks herself: This situation exemplifies the difficulties that many girls have in facing the motor challenges in the physical education classes, which may discourage this group to explore other bodily practices in adulthood. The games played in childhood and physical activities in adolescence seem to be related for both boys and girls.

As previously mentioned, the childhood context of the girls is per meated with more static activities, such as "play with dolls". These results show the distance girls keep from sport, preferring simpler activities that do not require complex abilities, like walking. As most sports require combined or specific abilities, and girls lack appropriate spaces and motivation to practice them since their childhood, their performance tends to be inferior. The comparison between the practices performed in child hood and those maintained in adolescence show that girls and boys carry cultural marks regarding physical education, and these marks are enhanced in adulthood, when the social repre sentations of both genders are more defined.

However, the importance of the reflection over the space occu pied by the gender issues in these discussions and the need of the teacher's intervention have been recognized, avoiding the neutral ization of the girls and motivating all the students to perform phys ical activities not only at school, but also in other social contexts. Physical education classes from the perspective of students and the implications for the practice of physical activities. This category include data to analyze the physical education classes from the students' point of view, who were at first questioned about their interest in the subject, after which content they has al ready experienced, and finally about which contents they considered the most important, in order to comprehend the boys and girls' views about this discipline.

For a better visualization and comprehension of the data obtained, three analysis topics were elaborated, each one presenting a discussion under the perspective of gender. When surveyed about the physical education discipline, These results show that the students do not share the same level of preference for the discipline.

Although there is partici pation in the classes, this participation is greater for the activities the students prefer. Probably the students who do not enjoy the activity remain seated of perform other non-related activities. In the studies by Darido et al.

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For Betti and Zuliani, , this distance is explained by the fact that students grade more the bodily practices performed outside school. According to the National Curricular Guidelines for High School Education Brazil, the physical education aims to provide opportunities for different practices of the corporal cul tural, building autonomy and criticism to experience, elaborate and organize them both for the individual and the society.

It is necessary to promote changes and transform the activities of the physical education classes, contextualizing them and making them meaningful to all students, reducing the distance and the lack of interest in the discipline Souza, ; Brasil, Moreover, girls present a higher percentual in the last category do not enjoy and do not participate in the classes. A significant difference was found between the participation of boys and girls in physical education classes, which may be associated with their distinct formation, based on socially con structed stereotypes and the inequality regarding opportunities and spaces available for the practice during the classes.

The girls surveyed in this study reported that the physical education classes are more appreciated by the boys because boys are more skillful and play better than girls; however, they also believe that mixed classes are more efficient to promote learning and relationship, favoring both genders. Since in the early childhood, boys and girls are raised different ly, controled by a set of social, cultural and psychological determi nants.

Household chores, family care and education are assigned to women, who devote all their time to these functions. This behavior is reflected over the school years and culmi nates in high school, when the teachers face the challenge of stimulating the girls to participate in PE classes, as they refuse to perform some activities stating that they do not want to sweat, break their nails or spoil the make-up. This scenario, built since childhood, interferes in the preferences and in the participation of the girls in the PE classes, being directly related with most girls' lack of ability to perform the activities.

Altmann, Ayoub and Amaral, interviewed PE teachers and found that half of the participants were concerned about gender issues while planning their classes and tried to offer equal opportunities for both genders. Despite the effort to plan co-educative strategies, this action reinforces gender stereo types, given the force of historical representations in the society. Although there are many challenges, a possible strategy is to include the students in didactic units based on the logic of coeducation, diversifying the contents to increase their inter est, create more involvement and demand less ability in the performance of the activities.

In addition, the teacher needs to analyze the classes with a critical and reflective view considering all the actions regarding gender. The questions below are specific to the contents of school physical education, analyzed under the perspective of the corporal culture, which understands the contents as "the result of socially produced knowledge, historically accumulated by humanity and that need to be redesigned and transmitted to the students at school" Soares et al. Thus, the following contents are seen as manifestations of the corporal culture: Such contents are funda mental for the historical and social formation of the citizen, which suggests that they should also be taught throughout the school years.

The students were asked about the contents they had expe rienced considering all the physical education classes they had had up to the moment they were completing the questionnaire. The questionnaire presented more than 20 options, in addition to one named "other", and the students should mark all the contents already presented in the PE classes.

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The answers are shown in the figure 1. In general, hegemony was present in the traditional sports in the physical education classes such as volleyball Interestingly, volleyball was the most frequently option indicated by students, most likely because it is one of the most rapidly growing sports in the country and has consolidated female participation.

In addition to the sport contents, games and play These less mentioned contents were also less present in the classes, demonstrating the lack of content diversity throughout the students' school life. This result confirms that school physical education is still heavy influenced by the sport model implemented in Brazil in the 60s, emphasizing the practice of sports Betti, This model tends to differentiate boys and girls during the classes, reinforcing gender stereotypes. Still, as a hegemonic content in the physical education class es, sport prevent the development of other elements of the corporal culture.

A good formation provides the teacher with conditions to experience and acquire knowledge about bodily culture in order to apply these concepts while teaching. According to Forquin, , Mello, and Neira, , one should master the contents and their meaning before teaching them. After pointing the most experienced and the less relevant practices in the physical education classes, the students were asked about their preference regarding the contents in a scale from 1 to 9, in order of preference. The final score was obtained calculating the average of all the grades attributed to each practice; thus, the scores closer to 1 are the most appreciated, while the scores closer to 9 are the least appreciated by the respondents.

In general, sports are regarded by the students as the content with higher priority, while circus is ranked last. The students appreciate more the contents they have already experienced; e. Circus practices might have been considered less important for the students due to the fact that such bodily manifestations are not approached at school or even it is taught with very little significance. Significant discrepancies are observed in a comparative analysis of the preferences of boys and girls regarding some bodily practices as shown in Figures 2 and 3.

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The results go beyond "dislike" for not having knowledge about the practice and are associated to with social representations regarding these practices from the perspective of gender. Sports was ranked first by the girls, with a grade of 3. The boys attributed a score of 2 to sports, considering this content more preferable in comparison with the girls, who attributed grade 3. Games and play 4. Similarly to the girls, circus was ranked last by the boys 6. Dance is the third favorite content for the girls 3. These findings clearly show that, despite enjoying a particular bodily practice, the opinion of the students is grounded on the social characteristics of these activities.

According to Andreoli, , the gender construction regarding dance is associated with more sensitive bodies and the estetic hegemonically represented by the female body. For the author, the men, marked by the virile mas culinity, have to overcome huge social barriers to develop this practice.

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The boys are also distant from other corporal practices, as gymnastics. This content also presented discrepance in the pref erence between bous and girls, being ranked in second by the girls 3. This corporal practice, like dance, is culturally related to the female body, being less attractive for boys, despite the existence of modalities for men Ferretti, Fighting and martial arts also presented different views from boys and girls, pointed as the fourth favorite content by the boys 4. Unlike dance, fighting and martial arts reprensent masculinity and virility; therefore, the women who practice this sport also suffer prejudice and are very often considered homossexual.

The gender representation on the corporal practices in pres ent in the school physical education, interfering in the students's tastes and in the contents associated with this discipline. The official documents Brazil, ; that regulate physical education in high school stablish that the teachers should pro mote the coeducation, with equality for knowledge acquisition, respect for the differences, and good relationship, avoiding sexist behavior that reinforce gender stereotypes.

Such actions are critical to prevent students from creating prejudice against the different contents in physical education. This means that the students cannot simply 'dislike' the activ ities based in gender stereotypes, without experiencing them. Thus, it is of utmost importance that the physical education teacher provides the students with diversified contents, in order to amplify their cultural repertoire. Even more relevant is the presence of the thematic of gender, emphasizing the importance of social relations marked by respect, minimizing the sexist stereotypes.

This study aimed to analyze the bodily practices performed by high school students both inside and outside physical edu cation PE classes, arguing from the perspective of gender. In general, it was observed that boys are more physically active than girls with regard to both the practices performed outside of school and their participation in PE classes.

The results of this study indicate that boys and girls show distinctions in their choices and preferences for body manifes tations. Outside of school, girls prefer activities such as walking and cycling, while in school they prefer sports, gymnastics and dance. Boys, on the other hand, prefer sports, games and fighting, both in and outside of school.

In terms of bodily prac tices, the students' relationships reflect the social imagination regarding demonstrations that are considered masculine and feminine, constructions that are historically grounded on prej udice and discrimination. There is a feedback relation between the mechanisms of involvement with the different bodily practices in and outside of the physical education classes; i. Therefore, the PE classes play a fundamental role in the formation of a critical view regarding bodily practices and should bring concepts to be experienced in concrete situations of teaching and learning.

High school students bring good and bad experiences that need to be explored and transformed in the physical education classes under the perspective of gender. Thus, this curricular component should contain different physical activities to be performed by all students, abolishing discriminatory barriers rooted in the culture. Despite the exploratory character of the present study, once there are few similar investigations in the literature and the data available cannot be generalized to other environments without the analysis of the specificities inherent to each context, , this study has some implications and provides important information for the elaboration and orientation of the contents in physical education classes and their relation with the performance of physical activities outside of the school under the perspective of gender.

It is important to highlight the importance of the stu dents' preferences and representations, once these social actors are more than often disregarded during the education process. The results of the present study demonstrated that: The small variety of contents, the hegemony in some sport practices, the lack of interest and the discredit on this curricular component lead to the students' absenteeism. In addition, the classes do not include discussions about gender; 4 Finally, there seem to be a clear relation between the physical activities performed outside of the shcool and those performed during the PE classes; i.

However, further studies using the same methodology are needed to better investigate these interactions. A deeper analysis on how the physical activity practice can be vinculated to the concept of everyday life defined by Certeau, is an important indicator in terms of new investigations. Thus, new studies can analyze, among other things, how the development of bodily practices is socially operated as an ex pression of young individuals' everyday lives. The challenges regarding effective transformations in gender representations are numerous and exceed the specificities of physical education; however, this curricular component cannot be exempted from pursuing equality and respect.

The diversity of contents elaborated from a critical and creative perpective is a possible way to minimize the gender differences in physical education, creating an environment where all students are able to practice and appreciate the bodily practices unbiasedly, as both boys and girls have the right to fully experience different bodily culture manifestations.

Marias and men in physical education. Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brasil. Dance, gender and sexuality: Conjectura, 15 1 , Physical Education, 3th and 4th cycles.