Journal of Teaching in Physical Education, 2016, 35, 337-348
Human Kinetics sail
http://dx.doi.org/10.1123/jtpe.2016-0112 ©2016 Human Kinetics, Inc.
ARTICLES
Teacher Fidelity to a Physical Education Curricular Model and Physical Activity Outcomes Michalis Stylianou The University of Queensland
Tiffany Kloeppel Flamson Middle School
Pamela Kulinna Arizona State-Polytechnic Campus
Han van der Mars Arizona State-Polytechnic Campus Background: This study was informed by the bodies of literature emphasizing the role of physical educa tion in promoting physical activity (PA) and addressing teacher fidelity to curricular models. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to compare student PA levels, lesson context, and teacher PA promotion behavior among classes where teachers were using the Dynamic Physical Education (DPE) curricular model with low, moderate, and high fidelity. Methods: Participants were 20 physical education teachers, and their 4th and 5th grade students. Each teacher was observed teaching three times during the study. Fidelity data were collected using a validated observation instrument. PA, lesson context, and teacher behavior data were collected using the System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time (SOFIT). Data analysis included descriptive statistics and group difference tests. Results: Significant differences among the three fidelity groups were identified in sev eral items of the observation instrument. No significant moderate-to-vigorous PA or lesson context differences were found among the three groups. Students taught by teachers in the high fidelity group spent a significantly higher proportion of lesson time (7.5%) in vigorous PA than students taught by teachers in the low fidelity group. Teachers in the moderate and high fidelity groups spent a significantly higher proportion of lesson time promoting in-class PA than teachers in the low fidelity group. Discussion: Fidelity of implementation to the DPE model had little impact on student PA. The findings of this study can inform future researchers about the methodological importance of examining teacher fidelity to curricular models and associated outcomes. Keywords: SOFIT, Dynamic Physical Education; elementary school; systematic observation The extensive health benefits of physical activity (PA) participation for youth are well documented (Jans sen & LeBlanc, 2010), but large proportions of American youth do not meet the national PA guidelines (National PA Plan Alliance, 2014). Schools have been identified as ideal settings for promoting PA (Institute of Medicine [IOM], 2013; Pate et al., 2006) and physical education Stylianou is with the School of Human Movement and Nutrition Sciences, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. Kloeppel is with the Physical Education Dept., Flamson Middle School, Paso Robles Joint Unified School District, Paso Dobles, California. Kulinna and van der Mars are with Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College, Arizona State-Polytechnic Campus, Mesa, Arizona. Address author correspondence to Michalis Stylianou at
[email protected].
has been highlighted as a promising avenue in promoting youth PA (Sallis & McKenzie, 1991; Sallis et al., 2012). This study was informed by the literature emphasizing the role of physical education in promoting PA as well as the body of work addressing teacher fidelity to cur ricular models.
Physical Activity in Physical Education The role of physical education in public health and, spe cifically, in promoting PA, has been widely recognized (IOM, 2013; Sallis & McKenzie, 1991; Sallis et al., 2012; USDHHS, 2000,2011). The national physical education standards (SHAPE America, 2013) also emphasize the role of physical education in PA education and promotion, 337
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including the knowledge and skills to achieve and main tain a health-enhancing level of PA (Standard 3), and the recognition of the various benefits of PA (Standard 5). Objectives related to physical education and PA are also included in the Healthy People documents (USDHHS, 2000,2011;U.S. Public Health Service, 1991). An objec tive for 50% of physical education class time spent in MVPA has been included in Healthy People documents as far back as 1991 (U.S. Public Health Service, 1991) and until Healthy People 2010 (USDHHS, 2000). Although this objective is no longer present in the Healthy People 2020 document (possibly due to a lack of relevant data to determine progress), it is included in the Institute of Medicine report (IOM, 2013) and seems to still be a commonly used guideline across the literature. Some researchers have focused on the effective ness of specific physical education curricular models in promoting PA. For example, relevant research has been conducted around the SPARK model (e.g., Sallis et al., 1997), the Sport Education model (e.g., Hastie & Trost, 2002), and the Tactical Games model (e.g., Smith et al., 2015). The Dynamic Physical Education model (DPE) is another model that focuses on PA as a central short-term (i.e., lesson level) and long-term outcome.
Dynamic Physical Education: A Multi-Activity Physical Education Curriculum Within physical education, there are several curricular models that run the gamut from movement education to adventure education and multiactivity models. The DPE model for elementary school children (Pangrazi & Beighle, 2016), a multiactivity model, is the focus of this study. This model was chosen because of its emphasis on PA as well as because it is one of the most prevalent models used by physical education teachers both across the US and in the state in which this study was conducted. The DPE curriculum model for elementary school children has had over 40 years of implementation and revision (Dauer, 1968; Pangrazi & Beighle, 2016). The model includes a textbook as well as a curriculum guide resource text with complete developmentally appropri ate lesson plans connected to state and national physical education standards. A standard elementary DPE lesson lasts for 30 minutes and includes four parts: (a) an intro ductory activity (2-3 minutes), (b) fitness development (7-8 minutes), (c) lesson focus (15-20 minutes), and (d) a game activity (5-7 minutes) (Pangrazi & Beighle, 2016). The DPE model places PA as one of the “core” elements of every quality physical education program (Pangrazi & Beighle, 2016, p. 17). When describing the characteristics of quality lessons (e.g., short instructional episodes), the authors highlight that “the common threat that runs through these characteristics is a high level of physical activity through well-planned, efficient lessons” (p. 78). The authors also embrace that “students should be
engaged in physical activity for at least 50% of the lesson time” (p. 78). Accordingly, DPE emphasizes engaging in immediate PA upon entering the activity area and during the introductory activity. It uses the fitness development section to maximize PA participation in lessons, but also focuses on maximizing active engagement and PA during the lesson focus. In both the fitness development and lesson focus sections, teachers are expected to, and lesson plans often include prompts to, encourage students to be physically active outside the physical education class (e.g., by identifying equipment and spaces they could use to practice what they learn in physical education). The model also places emphasis on monitoring in-class and out-of-class PA, and provides extensive information for the use of pedometers in physical education lessons. This model has been adopted by a school district in the US. The specific district’s physical education program has been identified as having achieved systemic success, defined as quality physical education in schools, effective teacher education programs, and a working relationship between the two (Prusak, Pennington, Graser, Beighle, & Morgan, 2010). This has been attributed to a districtwide program (common curriculum), a district coordinator, ongoing professional development, and district-university partnership (Prusak et al., 2010). Morgan, Beighle, and Pangrazi (2007) also examined PA in relation to the DPE model using pedometers. According to their findings, the least, moderately, and most active children (based on baseline PA data) accumulated approximately 1,700, 1,100, and 2,500 more steps, respectively, on school days with physical education compared with school days without it. However, a concept that is useful to take into account when examining outcomes related to various curricular models is fidelity of implementation.
Curricular Fidelity Teacher fidelity to curricular models refers to how closely a particular curricular model is implemented in compari son with the original author design (O’Donnell, 2008). In the area of physical education and sport pedagogy, standards-based curricula and model-based instruction are strongly emphasized (Lund & Tannehill, 2014; Metzler, 2011). Accordingly, several reviews have been conducted on models such as Sport Education (Hastie, Martinez de Ojeda, & Calderon, 2011), Cooperative Leaning (Casey & Goodyear, 2015), and game centered approaches (Harvey & Jarrett, 2014). Moreover, several scholars have written about and/or examined fidelity to different curricular models. For instance, Hastie and Casey (2014) prepared a guide for investigations focusing on modelsbased practice that highlighted a rich description of the curricular elements of the unit, a detailed validation of model implementation, and a detailed description of the program context. Other scholars examined fidelity to various models in physical education and sport pedagogy, including the Dynamic Physical Education model (Kloeppel, Kulinna, Stylianou, & van der Mars, 2013; Kloeppel,
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Curricular Model Fidelity and PA Outcomes
Stylianou, & Kulinna, 2014), the Cooperative Learning model (Casey, Goodyear, & Dyson, 2015), the Teaching Personal and Social Responsibility (TPSR) model (Lee et al., 2013; Pascual et al., 2011), a constructivist sciencebased physical education curriculum (Zhu, Ennis, & Chen, 2011), and a research- and science-based physical education curricular model (Loflin, 2013). Although fidelity of im plementation is rarely reported in studies that examine the effectiveness of K -l 2 curriculum interventions (O’Donnell, 2008), this is par ticularly important with regard to how fidelity influences associated outcomes and whether study findings can be attributed to specific models (Casey et al., 2015; U.S. Department of Education, 2006). In the area of physical education, determining fidelity in research related to the Spectrum of Teaching Styles has been a methodological requirement since the 1990s (Byra, 2000). However, research studies focused on student outcomes relative to fidelity of curricular model implementation are very limited. According to the findings of Casey et al. (2015), high levels of fidelity to the Cooperative Learning model helped students to support each other in the learning process. Similarly, Pascual et al. (2011) found that higher fidelity of implementation of the TPSR model was associ ated with better student performance on the TPSR respon sibility levels. Loflin (2013) reported that high fidelity levels to a research-based and science-based physical education curricular intervention were associated with student knowledge growth but not with the time students spent in moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA). Overall, more research is needed to gain a deep understanding of the relationship between fidelity of curricular model imple mentation in physical education and associated student outcomes, including PA.
Purpose Given that physical education research examining cur ricular fidelity and PA-related outcomes is very limited, the purpose of this study was to compare student PA levels, lesson context, and teacher behavior in terms of PA promotion in classes where teachers were using the DPE curricular model with various levels of fidelity. The find ings of this study can potentially inform both research and practice, and may be particularly important for scholars and physical education specialists who are interested in student PA levels relative to specific curricular models.
Methods Recruitment, Participants, and Setting Participants were recruited from a pool ( N = 50) of physi cal education teachers who met the following criteria: (a) graduated from a physical education teacher education program in the Western US that focused on the DPE model, (b) graduated within 2-7 years before the study, and (c) were teaching at elementary schools where the
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DPE curricular model was being implemented. The final sample for this study included 20 physical education teachers (10 female, 10 male; mean teaching experience = 4.7 years, SD = 1.92 years; White = 11, Hispanic = 4, Asian = 2, African American = 2, Native American = 1) working in 18 elementary schools in seven different school districts in a large urban area in the Western US, together with their 4th and 5th grade students (N = 1288, male = 678, female = 610). Ten of the participating teach ers came from a district in which DPE is the officially adopted model and where teachers are provided with regular professional development related to the model. The other 10 teachers came from districts that encour aged, but did not officially adopt the model, nor offered the same type and amount of professional development. Class sizes of participating teachers ranged from 14 to 33 students. Before recruitment and data collection, Institutional Review Board Approval was obtained from the authors’ University. Approval was also obtained from all seven participating school districts and teachers provided informed consent. Parental consent and student assent for PA data were not required due to the nature of the data collection (i.e., direct observation).
Data Collection Fidelity data were collected using a DPE observation instrument/checklist completed during observations of physical education lessons. The instrument included 15 items and was developed and validated with three different groups of teachers (see Kloeppel et al., 2013). These items related to lesson structure (intro, fitness, lesson focus, game), management (e.g., move and freeze, forming groups/teams), equipment (e.g., equipment is laid out and easily accessible), lesson content (e.g., lesson comes from the DPE book), and instruction (e.g., teacher instructions are shorter than 30 s). The observation instrument is presented in Table 1. Three codes were used when observing lessons using this instrument: yes (i.e., item is present/used), no (i.e., item is not present/used), and not applicable (i.e., item is not relevant for this lesson; e.g., if no grouping techniques were needed). F id elity.
P hysical Activity, Lesson Context, Teacher Behavior.
As discussed in the introduction section, student PA levels as well as in-class and out-of-class PA promotion by teachers are core outcomes of the DPE model. In addition, the model focuses on different lesson parts (e.g., fitness) and practices (e.g., brief instructional episodes, quick and well-practiced grouping and equipment distribution methods) to maximize PA engagement. In this study, PA data were collected using direct observation through the System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time (SOFIT; McKenzie, 2015). Direct observation is less invasive than other PA data collection techniques and also gives the opportunity to collect con textual data (McKenzie & van der Mars, 2015). Further,
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