Teaching Physical Education in Limited Space

Welcome!

We are excited about your interest in taking this online course from PE Central. Below you will find a brief course description, the instructor's biography, and course FAQ's. We estimate that this course will take six hours to complete. Once you have completed it, you may request the 6 hours towards your teacher licensure re-certification.

We know you will find this course valuable and enjoyable. If you have any questions, please email us at [email protected].

Best of Luck!
PE Central and Human Kinetics Professional Development

Target Audience

This course has been designed primarily for elementary physical education teachers, as most middle and high schools have proper gymnasiums and teaching space for physical education. However, middle and high school physical education instructors can also benefit, as you may find yourself sharing space with multiple classes on many days, or in situations where you are relegated to a limited space. For this course, we focus on developing a working knowledge of what limited space looks like, how it affects students’ holistic development in the short and long term, examine limited space guidelines and best practices, evaluate exemplar limited space activities, and learn to create a limited space lesson that meets limited space guidelines, physical education teaching best practices and the needs of the whole child. Our instructor is here to help you throughout the course.

The purpose of this course is to introduce the overall concept of limited space and how it affects our students’ overall development and demonstrate, through reflective learning, how limited space strategies and physical education best practices can be implemented in a limited space physical education setting to properly engage students per physical education norms. At the end of the course physical educators will have the knowledge and skills needed to teach high-quality physical education effectively in any space.

Course Description

American schools’ infrastructure is aging, as almost half of schools were built for baby boomers, which means those schools are up to fifty to sixty years old. In addition, the funds for school infrastructure improvement has dropped significantly to $10 billion in 2012, while enrollment in school is expected to increase gradually through 2019. Moreover, it is estimated that it will take $270 billion to fix America’s aging school infrastructure, an amount that is astronomical and seemingly impossible. This means schools are overcrowded or were not built or retrofitted with proper space for physical education. Therefore, physical education teachers are left to teach in a myriad of limited space situations, which ultimately result in negative outcomes for the students’ physical, emotional, and academic well-being. Thus, this course explores what limited space looks and feels likes, the affect it has long term and short term on a child’s holistic growth, what best practices are for teaching physical education as norms state it should be taught, but while doing so in limited space, examining exemplar limited space lessons and activities, and reflective thinking on how to handle limited space situations that can occur. This course is a comprehensive learning experience on teaching physical education in limited space.

Course Goals

On completion of this course, physical educators will be able to:

• define limited space.
• identify constraints of teaching in limited space.
• demonstrate an understanding of how lack of physical activity due to limited space affects effective physical education best practices.
• demonstrate an understanding of how lack of physical activity due to limited space affects students’ health and academics short and long term.
• identify safety protocols and effective limited space teaching strategies to demonstrate knowledge of best practices in said environment.
• to review exemplar limited space lessons and activities to evaluate what makes them highly effective, including physical education best practices.
• evaluate limited space situations to explain how they would teach a highly effective lesson in said scenarios.

Standards

This course addresses the following standards:

Source: SHAPE America National Standards for K-12 Physical Education (2016).

Standard 1 - The physically literate individual demonstrates competency in a variety of motor skills and movement patterns.

Standard 2 - The physically literate individual applies knowledge of concepts, principles, strategies and tactics related to movement and performance.

Standard 3 - The physically literate individual demonstrates the knowledge and skills to achieve and maintain a health-enhancing level of physical activity and fitness.

Standard 4 - The physically literate individual exhibits responsible personal and social behavior that respects self and others.

Standard 5 - The physically literate individual recognizes the value of physical activity for health, enjoyment, challenge, self-expression and/or social interaction.

Teaching physical education in limited space is still teaching. With an obesity epidemic where it is thought that our current generation of children may not outlive their parents, physical education plays an important role in reversing this trend. With such high stakes, the excuse of not having enough space to adequately teach physical education is no longer acceptable. With this in mind — the aim of this course to teach how to teach in limited space so that students get the same experience and benefits of being in a regular physical education situation — the course naturally involves all five of the national standards. It involves all five of the national standards because best practices and teaching of physical education involve alignment with each standard at one point or another in the curricular year. Moreover, by aligning with all five standards, the course ensures that the needs of the child are met as those same needs are negatively affected by having physical education in a limited space. If we are to reverse obesity trends and teach in limited space the right way with no excuses, all five standards will play guiding roles.