Abstract

The purpose of this study was to describe and examine two experienced teachers' pedagogical content knowledge and pedagogical theories of content as manifested in their descriptions and practice of teaching. The focus of the study was on the instructional tasks and how they were communicated to students. Two research questions guided this study: (a) What instructional practices do experienced physical education teachers employ in teaching the target content (i.e., volleyball)? and (b) What are the teachers' pedagogical theories (and/or educational beliefs) of volleyball and to what extent are they manifested in their practices?

Participants in the study were two experienced elementary school physical education teachers each of whom taught a unit of volleyball to one class of fourth- and one class of fifth- and/or fourth and fifth combined-grade students. Systematic observations of all classes, formal and informal interviews, and field notes were data sources. The case and cross case methods were employed for the analysis of data.

Findings indicated that the two teachers chose mostly different tasks to teach similar content, but each teacher assigned similar learning tasks to her students in the two grade levels. The teachers varied the task characteristics in terms of focus and organizational arrangements to adjust the content to individual needs and improve the quality of performance. Some of the tasks did not appear to advance efficiently authentic performance capabilities. Both teachers used a wide repertoire of dynamic and alternative verbal and visual representations to communicate content to the students.

While the task choices, progressions, and alternative representations of content were based on and reflected the teachers' pedagogical content knowledge, the teachers' decisions concerning the inclusion and/or exclusion of content and sequence of skills were based on their pedagogical theories of content. The analysis showed that central to physical education teachers' pedagogical content knowledge are the task choices and progressions the teachers use in teaching to enhance the content understanding and authentic performance capabilities.