Subject Matter Analysis in Physical Education

Background

Physical education is a school discipline that traditionally deals with a particular set of human activity whether it is named Physical Culture activities, Sport activities or Athletic activities. Besides the matter about which term would be best suited for referring to those phenomena, a theoretical use of the term activity in those expressions can contribute to an understanding of the educational role of the respective discipline. To concentrate on the discussion of the theoretical meaning of the term activity, I will use the expression physical education activities, as a general reference to the different manifestations related to a voluntary and non-utilitarian bodily action like Game, Dance, Gymnastic, Combat Games, Athletics and Swimming. From a theoretical perspective physical education activities must be understood, first and foremost, as a product of societal practice. These activities embody societal needs, objects and goals, historically produced in a field of voluntary and non-utilitarian bodily actions. In this sense, physical education activities can be understood as being connected to and arising from other kinds of human activities, namely: play and art. On this topic, Elkonin (1998) outlines the developmental process of bodily actions.