Acculturation of prospective German physical education teachers

Abstract

Studies of prospective physical education teachers’ (PPETs’) acculturation have been useful in terms of facilitating the development of effective physical education teacher education (PETE) programmes because they provide teacher education faculty with a description of incoming recruits’ values and beliefs and an understanding of how these values and beliefs are shaped. Research exclusively focused on the acculturation of PPETs is, however, scarce. Research on pre-service and in-service physical education (PE) teachers that has included an acculturation component has mostly been completed in the United States. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to examine the acculturation of 10 German PPETs. The two research questions we attempted to answer were: (a) “What were the PPETs’ values, beliefs, and perspectives regarding PE?” and (b) “What factors shaped these values, beliefs and perspectives?” Data were collected using three types of interviewing. Analysis involved coding and categorizing data with analytic induction and constant comparison and reducing them to meaningful themes. Findings revealed that eight PPETs had well-developed and comparatively sophisticated conservative teaching orientations primarily focused on teaching traditional German sports. Two PPETs had more progressive teaching orientations in that they favored teaching a wider range of content and were more focused on health-related fitness. The key subsidiary attractors to a career in PE for this group of PPETs were remaining connected to sport and working with young people. Three factors that shaped the PPETs’ values and beliefs were similar to those revealed in previous research. These were family and friends, the apprenticeship of observation, and youth sport. The people and institutions that comprised these factors, however, operated in different modes within the German context. In addition, PPETs’ career choices were solidified by their experiences of teaching, coaching, and officiating, and the type of teaching orientation they possessed reflected the timing of these choices. The study also revealed that the PPETs entered PETE with a solid foundation of beliefs, values and perspectives regarding PE on which faculty could build. Findings also suggested, however, that German PETE faculty may have to deconstruct their charges’ conservative teaching orientations to some extent in order to create space in which to teach them new instructional models. The most important implication of this study for PETE in other countries is that the PPETs’ teaching orientations resulted primarily from a system that did not pit curricular PE against extracurricular sport.