PE teacher in a wheel-chair: practicum experience of a teraplegic pe teacher-student

Por Z. Matos (Autor), P. Batista (Autor), M. Rafael (Autor).

Em Athens 2004: Pre-olympic Congress

Integra

Introduction

The practice of one’s pedagogical abilities assumes several forms and meanings. There are few conducted studies in this area concerning "handicapped" PE teachers. The challenges of a "tetraplegic PE teacher trainee" (TPETT) has to face during the "practicum" place new questions about how relations between teachers and students should be established. The case in wich we look into took place in the 2001/02 school year, enclosed in the FCDEF-UP «practicum». This study’s purpose is to compare the content of the TPETT’s evaluation, taking into consideration both the institutional evaluation (related to the established goals of teacher training), the self-evaluation (related to the teacher’s perceived ability), aswell as the evaluation by the teacher’s students (their perception of the teacher’s performance).

Methods

The documents relating the TPETT’s final evaluation, produced by both supervisors (the one from the school where the «practicum» took place aswell as the one from the University), the self-evaluation report and the questionaire in wich the TPETT’s students were asked to give their opinion concerning the lessons, were all analysed, framed into the following dimensions: «instruction», «learning environment», «discipline», «managing» and also the added «teacher’s characteristics» category. The «Content Analysis» technique and some basic parameters of descriptive statistics were used in the data analysis process.

Results

All the evaluations were positive with A level standarts. The institucional evaluation points out: the connections, in different dimensions, between planning and the actual classes, the focusing on the essencial, and the great capacity to develope teaching strategies. The self-evaluation by the TPETT gave us a positive feedback both on «instruction» and on teacher/student relationship. As for the students, they recognized the PE lessons were «different» in a good way, mainly on «instruction», «managing» and «learning environment» issues.

Discussion / Conclusions

There was a clear convergence in the content of the three evaluations. The special characteristics of the TPETT generated a positive difference in the lessons. It was demonstrated that from the pedagogical ability point of view, what actually counts the most is the teacher’s personality as a whole. The students mentioned the learning process was improved from previous years, not only on what concerns motors skills but also on psychosocial aspects.

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