High School Students' Attitudes Toward Physical Education in Delaware

Authors

  • Janice M. Bibik
  • Stephen C. Goodwin
  • Elizabeth M. Orsega-Smith

Abstract

It is important to understand high school students’ attitudes and perceptions toward physical education since they will be future members of the workforce who will need to use their knowledge to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Content standards are intended to assure that all students meet minimum curricular requirements, however, if students do not find physical education valuable, the content standards may have no meaning either. High school students’ attitudes toward their physical education programs in the state of Delaware were studied. These results provide a baseline for further examination of curriculum after implementation of state content standards. The students’ (N = 223) attitudes were measured using a 31-item survey. Results indicated approximately 45% of the students would enjoy having more sports or games in their physical education curriculum. The majority (74%) of the students indicated they preferred coeducational classes and 64% preferred working with other students of similar abilities. 43% of the students also indicated that physical education was important to their high school education, rating it just after math, english, and science. Correlation tests revealed that the majority of students who indicated they enjoyed physical education were more likely to enjoy school (p<.001). Students who engaged in negative health behaviors, that is, smoking, drinking, or using drugs, were less likely to enjoy physical education (p<.005). These findings are important for designing meaningful high school physical education learning experiences that meet state content standards and for influencing students to continue participating in physical activity.

Downloads

Published

2007-10-26

Issue

Vol. 64 No. 4 (2007)

Section

Articles

License

Sagamore Publishing LLC (hereinafter the “Copyright Owner”)

Journal Publishing Copyright Agreement for Authors

PLEASE REVIEW OUR POLICIES AND THE PUBLISHING AGREEMENT, AND INDICATE YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF THE TERMS BY CHECKING THE ‘AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS COPYRIGHT NOTICE’ CHECKBOX BELOW.

I understand that by submitting an article to The Physical Educator, I am granting the copyright to the article submitted for consideration for publication in The Physical Educator to the Copyright Owner. If after consideration of the Editor of the The Physical Educator, the article is not accepted for publication, all copyright covered under this agreement will be automatically returned to the Author(s).

THE PUBLISHING AGREEMENT

Assignment of Copyright

I hereby assign to the Copyright Owner the copyright in the manuscript I am submitting in this online procedure and any tables, illustrations or other material submitted for publication as part of the manuscript in all forms and media (whether now known or later developed), throughout the world, in all languages, for the full term of copyright, effective when the article is accepted for publication.

Reversion of Rights

Articles may sometimes be accepted for publication but later be rejected in the publication process, even in some cases after public posting in “Articles in Press” form, in which case all rights will revert to the Author.

Retention of Rights for Scholarly Purposes

I understand that I retain or am hereby granted the Retained Rights. The Retained Rights include the right to use the Preprint, Accepted Manuscript, and the Published Journal Article for Personal Use and Internal Institutional Use.

All journal material is under a 12 month embargo. Authors who would like to have their articles available as open access should contact Sagamore-Venture for further information.

In the case of the Accepted Manuscript and the Published Journal Article, the Retained Rights exclude Commercial Use, other than use by the author in a subsequent compilation of the author’s works or to extend the Article to book length form or re-use by the author of portions or excerpts in other works.

Published Journal Article: the author may share a link to the formal publication through the relevant DOI.

Author Representations

  • The Article I have submitted to the journal for review is original, has been written by the stated author(s) and has not been published elsewhere.
  • The Article was not submitted for review to another journal while under review by this journal and will not be submitted to any other journal.
  • The Article contains no libelous or other unlawful statements and does not contain any materials that violate any personal or proprietary rights of any other person or entity.
  • I have obtained written permission from copyright owners for any excerpts from copyrighted works that are included and have credited the sources in the Article.
  • If the Article was prepared jointly with other authors, I have informed the co-author(s) of the terms of this Journal Publishing Agreement and that I am signing on their behalf as their agent, and I am authorized to do so.