Perspectives In Physical Education

PERSPECTIVES IN PHYSICAL EDUCATION WALTER P. KROLL University of Massachusetts ACADEMIC PRESS New York and London COPYRIGHT © 1971, BY ACADEMIC PRESS, I N C . ALL RIGHTS RESERVED NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM, BY PHOTOSTAT, MICROFILM, RETRIEVAL SYSTEM, OR ANY OTHER MEANS, WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION FROM THE PUBLISHERS. ACADEMIC PRESS, INC. I l l Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10003 United Kingdom Edition published by ACADEMIC PRESS, INC. (LONDON) LTD. Berkeley Square House, London W1X 6BA LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD N U M B E R : 76-137614 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA PREFACE To say that physical education is experiencing rapid change and growth is merely to say that physical education is part of the twentieth century. But it seems reasonable to suggest that physical education is in the midst of something more than just normal growth pains due to the population increase and the explosion of knowledge and technology. Historically a part of education, physical education shares the changes sweeping across educational theory and practice. Goals and objectives, trends and fads, curriculum revisions and professional problems of physical education have always been inextricably interwoven with those of the education profession, but today an undeniably new movement is afoot in physical education. Although quietly developing at first, the new movement is mushrooming into a full blown giant almost brash and discourteous to traditional concepts of physical education. This new movement is, of course, that associated with the establishment of physical education as an academic discipline. Visionaries involved with this new movement see physical education as something more than just an area of study whose major responsibility is the training of teachers and coaches to conduct games and sports in the public schools; more than just an area where graduate education and research have the responsibility of producing better teachers and coaches to conduct more games and sports for more and more of our citizens. Such rebels against tradition also see physical education as concerned with the nature and meaning of human movement in its many forms, with the establishment of a science of exercise, and with inquiry into the why rather than solely the how of physical activity. One of the origins—or one of the consequences—of this new movement has been an enormous increase in the emphasis and prestige given to research. This new emphasis, furthermore, has been primarily upon scientific research rather than just an increased production rate of IX X PREFACE the kinds of research previously done by physical educators. No longer is poor research excused because it was done by physical educators for physical education consumption and was "good enough." As a result of strong demands for excellence in research, major changes have occurred in the programs of study being offered in physical education. Undergraduate and graduate course prerequisites have broadened, graduate course offerings bear strange new titles, and research laboratories are springing up that are as well equipped as many in the basic sciences. No wonder that the new graduate student often finds himself in a different academic world from that he expected. Most undergraduate major programs have by necessity concentrated upon preparation of a competent, well-prepared practitioner with sound professional characteristics. When the student appears for graduate work he justifiably expects more of the same kind of preparation; but this is now seldom the case in many of the newer quality programs of graduate study. Instead of a laboratory section to sharpen his officiating skills, he finds himself making oxygen content analyses of gas samples collected on obese women in a mental institution. Inste