Initially i found the concept of physical literacy a tad bit confusing, because i didn’t read into it very much. However as the readings progressed I soon realized the entirety of how beautiful this theory or concept really is, very much like reading, physicality doesn’t have to be relegated to just sports, PE, getting into shape or pre-wedding traditions. Physical literacy looks at the entire life of the human whether they are inclined towards having phenomenal physical attributes or just someone who enjoys to walk and dance. The main point is that they get up and move, the texts and readings use key words and phrases such as, respectful, life long, holistic, adventurous, appropriate, trust, empathy, encouraging, and and many more.
The main point is that as educators there is a need to enable and encourage our students to keep on moving for the rest of their life. Thus we need to be mindful that we are creating an environment that will foster literate physical movers for life and that we need to focus both on the literacy part and the educational component of teaching rather than just using sports or their own innate motivations to attain this level of literacy.
Similarly to Ken, as I was doing the readings on physical literacy I felt slightly confused. There were multiple definitions and I was somewhat overwhelmed by the amount of information. After consideration I was able to pull out the dominant or recurring themes that seemed to run through the definitions and descriptions of physical literacy. I think Ken did a good job of naming some of them in his list of key words: “respectful, life long, holistic, adventurous, appropriate, trust, empathy, encouraging.” I think something that really stuck out to me throughout the readings and was reinforced through the group teach in class was the idea of providing students’ with experiences of success and the importance of fun. Those 2 concepts are crucial, in my mind, to sustaining a passion for physical activity for life. If my PE teachers had been more focused on meeting me where I was at, ensuring I experienced small successes and improvements, and that I was having an overall fun time, I think I would have had a much more positive outlook on incorporating activity in to my daily life as an adult. I think I would have been much more confident in my abilities and therefore much more motivated to continue actively participating in my lifelong physical literacy journey. I didn’t get exposed to yoga until I was in grade 10, but I am very thankful that I did because it has been one of the only forms of exercise that connected with me and that I have maintained throughout my life. Because my experiences in PE class were so sport-centered I didn’t feel I could ever find my place. After experiencing the Group Teach on Tuesday and their focus on respect, I have an even greater understanding of why creating that environment of safety, trust, respect and fun is so important. I am encouraged by the dialogue around physical literacy and how it encompasses so much more than sports or fundamental movement skills. I want to be able to provide those experiences of success and enjoyment for my students that have them loving some kind of activity for the rest of their lives.
Really nicely put! I’ve come to find that my understanding of “literacy” has shifted and grown immensely since becoming a part of this program. I can’t–and won’t–deny that my assumption had always been that physical literacy was all about sports and fitness. How very wrong I was! It encompasses so much more than that, and I’ve come to find myself respecting physical education and literacy so much more than I did in the past. As someone who absolutely detested PE in high school–in no small part due to all the fitness testing and my inherent clumsiness–I’ve come to be pleasantly surprised by how much I am enjoying our class. It’s wonderful to be able to expand my knowledge and ways of thinking, and the fact that we’re all here with one common goal makes it all the better.
I agree with you the concept of physical literacy was a little confusing. At first I thought the word of physical literacy and physical education both have the same meaning. But after I have read through the chapter and some articles, I realized they both are actually very different. It’s interesting that physical literacy is more of a lifestyle; whereas, physical education is more focused in teaching athletic sports. Yes, you are right it is important for ‘‘educators there is a need to enable and encourage our students to keep on moving for rest of their life.’’ So that can help us to create a healthy lifestyle, development of important social skills, and build our confidence into the environment. After we did our Group Teach on Tuesday, I have begun to realize and understand more how important it was to create a safe, trust, respect, empathy, and fun in the environment for the students. And this is what it brings educators to help students to become more success in the school or their life!
Thanks to your group for teaching this through your engaging lessons on Physical Literacy, it was stimulating and kept us busy through the class. “To keep moving”, your group motivated us through transition from one activity to the next. Great voice projection and leaders you are. Good team work. As I mentioned, that I was also abit confused about the readings, sometimes it’s the case studies that give it more meaning or definition for me. Definitely much more to learn about physical literacy. Actually I would like to see a list of words, that define physical literacy in some the future classrooms.
I have played sports my entire life but it hasn’t been until I started in this program that I thought about physical literacy. There is definitely some overlap with other forms of literacy, Physical literacy encompasses many different disciplines and creating a base of different skills will definitely help provide a broad base to build upon and create a greater sense of physically literacy. This echoes verbal and written literacy which expands exponentially with each new system learned. This makes me wonder how I can weave different subjects together to create both physical and linguistic literacy. It is apparent that there are different literacies withing athletics, baseball terminology concerning food, football terminology, much of which contains military terms and euphemisms, yoga which contains any number of Sanskrit term, etc. It seems that it would be quite easy to expand a student’s vocabulary and verbal literacy alongside physical literacy. In doing so, a student would be able to gain confidence in the physical areas practiced.