2. Literature Review
2.6 Relevant Research on Critically Oriented PETE Programmes
To date, it appears that much of the research on the effectiveness of PETE programmes has centred around what Zeichner (1983) terms the traditional/craft or behaviourist orientations, where, according to Curtner-Smith (2007):
The main focus, however, certainly seems to have been on transmitting technical skills as well as traditional curricula and content to PCT’s [Pre-service Classroom Teachers] viewed as being fairly passive in the whole process. (p. 37)
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Recent research on traditional/craft PETE or component courses focused on content and pedagogy presents mixed results (Carney & Chedzoy, 1998; Chedzoy, 2000; Faulkner, Reeves, & Chedzoy, 2004;; Tsangaridou, 2005). Tsangaridou’s (2005) study suggested that the PETE courses undertaken did, indeed, contribute to their pedagogical considerations and evolving teaching identity. However, other studies report that PETE programmes may have little influence on pre-service teacher preparation, suggesting that other factors including prior experience and levels of physical activity may be better predictors of physical education teacher confidence (Carney and Chedzoy, 1998; Chedzoy, 2000; Faulkner, Reeves, and Chedzoy, 2004).
Research on critically oriented PETE programmes appears more scant and unclear (Curtner-Smith, 2007). Gore (1990), in her study of a critically oriented PETE course suggested that pre-service students, who demonstrated greater commitment to teaching as a profession, were more inclined to embrace and problematize the social and political nature of schooling than those with less commitment and whose recalcitrant characteristics rejected the need to reflect on their own teaching.
In the latter half of this decade more research has begun to emerge around critically oriented PETE programmes (e.g. Curtner-Smith, 2007; Ovens, 2004; Philpot & Smith, 2011). While this research base is still relatively small, it may be gathering momentum and, therefore, will begin to address some of the questions raised around its placed in the PETE curriculum.
From an international perspective, Curtner-Smith (2007) examined the effectiveness of a six-week critically oriented methods course and a nine-week early field experience on one class of 24 pre-service primary classroom teachers (PCT’s). Evaluating the PCT’s capacity to critically reflect, he suggested that these manifested themselves as technocratic at best and reinforced the dominant messages presented in traditional methods courses. He continued to suggest that there was little evidence to support the PCT’s ability or willingness to critically reflect on the social and political nature of teaching and learning. Reasons for rejection of the critical nature of the course, he suggested, included powerful and extremely conservative forms of personal, cultural and programmatic factors.
Macdonald & Brooker (1999) and Tinning (2002) provide insight here, suggesting that critical pedagogues risk criticism from the majority who have been influenced by the pervasive, conservative and historical discourses that dominate and entrench traditional education, physical education and PETE environments.
It also appears to verify Gore’s (2003) concern around the social, political and historical nature of teachers work and the realities associated with implementation of attempts to work critically in traditional and conservative education environments.
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My major concerns are that these critical claims to empowerment attribute extraordinary abilities to the teacher, and hold a view of agency which risks ignoring the context of teachers’ work. Teachers are constrained by, for example, their location in patriarchal institutions… (p. 334)
In New Zealand, where physical education within the NZC (MOE, 2007) espouses a critical orientation, PETE programmes are charged with producing graduates who have the capacity to understand and enact its philosophical position. There is some research (Ovens, 2004; Philpot & Smith, 2011) in New Zealand around the capacity of critically oriented PETE programmes but this dearth suggests that much more is required if there is to be documented evidence to support or deny its overt claims. Ovens (2004), in his unpublished doctoral thesis explored the (im)possibility of critical reflection in PETE, suggesting that
Its very possibility lies in the complexity of the contexts students encounter as part of the existential landscape of teacher education and the factors that mediate their meaningful engagement with those contexts. (p. 261)
More recently, Philpot and Smith (2011) compared “the different beliefs about the nature and purpose of physical education of beginning and graduating physical education teacher education students” (p. 33). They concluded that both beginning and graduating students believed that physical education had wider educative purposes than developing physical skills alone and articulated purposes that extended beyond performance discourses. Indeed, the students acknowledged that physical education was both an uncertain and complex conceptualization. Interestingly, Philpot and Smith (2011) reported that graduates articulated a much deeper understanding of this complex conceptualization, and also the role that the teacher plays within it, than their less-experienced counterparts did. They concluded that the four-year critically oriented PETE programme may have contributed to the development of teaching behaviours that enabled the students to critically reflect on their evolving identity and understanding of teaching physical education.
This indeed presents a more positive view of the capacity appropriated to PETE programmes in New Zealand and suggests that some progress may be being made towards the development of effective critically oriented PETE programmes, however, as Philpot and Smith (2011) cautioned:
It is unclear how, or even if, the graduates ‘more than sport’ beliefs will survive the early years of socialization in the school physical education teaching context. (p. 43)