Scholars have suggested that physical education teacher education (PETE) faculty need an improved understanding of the content knowledge (CK) with which preservice teachers (PTs) enter PETE and to conduct more research aimed at discovering how to provide coursework that improves PTs’ CK and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of one content course and its follow-up early field experience (EFE) on PTs’ acquisition of CK and development of PCK. Three sub-questions which guided data collection and analysis were: (a) With what level of CK did PTs enter a PETE program? (b) How did PTs acquire CK and develop PCK during the content course? and (c) How did PTs acquire CK and develop PCK during the follow-up EFE connected with the content course?
Method:
Participants were 16 PTs enrolled in the content course and EFE. The content course consisted of 20 50-minute sessions in the pool on strokes, basic aquatic skills, and the pedagogies for teaching swimming. The five 40-minute EFE lessons involved PTs teaching 78 swimmers of various abilities and non-swimmers from the third grade of one local elementary school. Qualitative techniques employed to gather data were observations, document analysis, critical incident reports, and formal, informal, and stimulated recall interviews.
Analysis/Results:
Data were analyzed using analytic induction and constant comparison. Findings indicated that the majority of the PTs who began the course with very little CK and no PCK acquired impressive levels of both forms of knowledge and were fairly successful teaching during the EFE. During the content course, PTs’ focus on their own performance, the instructor’s modeling of pedagogies, and the class materials were key to the acquisition of CK and the development of PCK. CK and PCK acquired in the content course was reinforced during the EFE through planning and teaching. As the EFE progressed, 13 of the PTs shifted from using the tasks and pedagogies they had learned in the content course to “fill the time” to a focus on learning. Seven of the PTs made a second shift which involved developing their own tasks, progressions and cues.
Conclusions:
Factors that enhanced the acquisition of CK and PCK were the course structure, nature of the content, and the children who took part in the EFE. Factors that negated the effectiveness of the course were the level of PTs’ CK at entry and the length of the EFE.