An eroding social justice agenda: The case of physical education and health edu-business in schools

In this paper we draw on current research to explore notions of a socially just Health and Physical Education (HPE), in light of claims that a neoliberal globalisation promotes markets over the states, and a new individualism that privileges self-interest over the collective good. We also invite readers to consider United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s ambition for PE in light of preliminary findings from an Australian led research project exploring national and international patterns of outsourcing HPE curricula. Data were sourced from this international research project through a mixed method approach. Each external provider engaged in four phases of research activity: (a) Web-audits, (b) Interviews with external providers, (c) Network diagrams, and (d) School partner interviews and observations. Results We use these data to pose what we believe to be three emerging lines of inquiry and challenge for a socially just school HPE within neoliberal times. In particular our data indicates that the marketization of school HPE is strengthening an emphasis on individual responsibility for personal health, elevating expectations that schools and teachers will “fill the welfare gap” and finally, influencing the nature and purchase of educative HPE programs in schools. The apparent proliferation of external providers of health work, HPE resources and services reflects the rise and pervasiveness of neoliberalism in education. We conclude that this global HPE landscape warrants attention to investigate the extent to which external providers’ resources are compatible with schooling’s educative and inclusive mandates.

Coaching knowledge, learning and mentoring in the Australian Football League

Understanding the work of Senior and Assistant Coaches in the AFL is important to better develop the next generation of performance coaches. Hence the focus of this research was to examine the knowledge, competences and learning of senior and assistant coaches in the Australian Football League. Specifically, the research sought to understand the ways in which Senior and Assistant Coaches in the AFL have come to know their “craft” with the particular aim of enhancing future coaching practice. Performance coaching is generally regarded as a cognitive activity and therefore “getting inside the heads” of AFL coaches will assist in our understanding of the complex coaching work in which they are engaged. In-depth interviews provided coaches an opportunity to reflect on their practices and how they learned their craft. Fundamental to this research was an understanding that the AFL and each club within the league be regarded as learning organizations and workplaces where learning takes place. Moreover the process of mentoring is regarded as a central learning process and a significant factor contributing to improved professional coaching practice. This applied research aims to inform coach development in Australian football, the annual review process (quality of performance) of employed coaches, and the recruitment of coaches in the AFL. Improving the quality of coaching in the AFL will, in turn, improve the performance of the players and teams, and subsequently enhance the continued development and sustainability of the game.

Self and peer review in dance classes using personal video feedback

Many forms of formative feedback are used in dance training to refine the dancer’s spatial and kinaesthetic awareness in order that the dancer’s sensorimotor intentions and observable danced outcomes might converge. This paper documents the use of smartphones to record and playback movement sequences in ballet and contemporary technique classes. Peers in pairs took turns filming one another and then analysing the playback. This provided immediate visual feedback of the movement sequence as performed by each dancer. This immediacy facilitated the dancer’s capacity to associate what they felt as they were dancing with what they looked like during the dance. The often-dissonant realities of self-perception and perception by others were thus guided towards harmony, generating improved performance and knowledge relating to dance technique. An approach is offered for potential development of peer review activities to support summative progressive assessment in dance technique training.

Two worlds apart: Indigenous community perspectives and Non-Indigenous teacher perspectives on Australian schools

Our evaluation studies of Indigenous school reform begin from a different starting point: listening to, hearing and engaging with the commentaries, voices, narratives and analyses of Indigenous community as they discuss and recount their experiences and current encounters with Australian state schools. Here we undertake a contrastive documentation of the views of Indigenous community members, Elders, parents, education workers, and young people and, indeed, of the views of their non-Indigenous teachers and school principals. This is a dramatic picture of two distinctive cultural lifeworlds, communities and worldviews in contact, of two very different ‘constructions’ by participants of a shared, mutual experience: everyday interaction in the social field of the Australian school. Taken together, our Indigenous and non-Indigenous participants repeatedly confirmed and corroborated a key theme: that Indigenous peoples continue to be viewed and ‘treated’ through the lens and language of cultural, intellectual and moral ‘deficit’.

A definition of food literacy and its components

This chapter defines food literacy and its components using the empirical data collected in two studies undertaken in 2010 and 2011 as part of the author’s PhD thesis. The first was a Delphi study of Australian food experts and the second was a study of young adults across a spectrum of disadvantage. Defining food literacy and identifying its components was an iterative process. At different times throughout the research, each study informed the other. This chapter will describe the components of food literacy, the data used to identify them and how they combined to produce a definition of food literacy.

Relating food literacy to nutrition and health

This chapter describes the evolution of a model to propose the relationship between food literacy and nutrition. This model can also be used as a framework for program planning, implementation and evaluation. Practitioners and policy makers invest in food literacy with outcome expectations beyond diet quality. For this reason, a second model was developed to conceptualise the role of food literacy with respect to food security, body weight and chronic disease risk. This second model is useful in positioning food literacy within multi-strategic public health nutrition and chronic disease plans.

Context-based assessment: Creating opportunities for resonance between classroom fields and societal fields

There is on-going international interest in the relationships between assessment instruments, students’ understanding of science concepts and context-based curriculum approaches. This study extends earlier research showing that students can develop connections between contexts and concepts – called fluid transitions – when studying context-based courses. We provide an in-depth investigation of one student’s experiences with multiple contextual assessment instruments that were associated with a context-based course. We analyzed the student’s responses to context-based assessment instruments to determine the extent to which contextual tests, reports of field investigations, and extended experimental investigations afforded her opportunities to make connections between contexts and concepts. A system of categorizing student responses was developed that can inform other educators when analyzing student responses to contextual assessment. We also refine the theoretical construct of fluid transitions that informed the study initially. Implications for curriculum and assessment design are provided in light of the findings.