Original intentions and unintended consequences: the ‘contentious’ role of assessment in the development of Leaving Certificate Physical Education in Ireland

ABSTRACT

Ireland is set to introduce an examinable physical education curriculum (Leaving Certificate Physical Education (LCPE)) in the final two years of post-primary school. A Physical Education Development Group (PEDG) were tasked with the responsibility of constructing the LCPE specification. This paper explores the LCPE curriculum development process by drawing on Elias’s [(1978). What is sociology? New York: Columbia University Press] ‘game models’ framework to provide a theoretically informed analysis of the operations of the PEDG. Interviews were conducted with 10 PEDG members. The results revolved around curriculum content knowledge, assessment weightings, and debating the responsibility for assessing students’ work. The game models framework allowed us to understand the power-struggles in the PEDG and how they worked to arrive at a consensus about curriculum content and assessment. The outcome was one that no ‘player’ could have anticipated, and Elias’s game models framework shed light on how a curriculum with original intentions became a curriculum made up of unintended consequences.

KEYWORDS:

• Examinable physical education
• assessment
• Leaving Certificate Physical Education
• Norbert Elias game models
• curriculum development

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Dylan Scanlon’s research interests include (physical education) curriculum and assessment, examinable physical education, and sociology.

Prof. Ann MacPhail’s research interests revolve around (physical education) teacher education, young people in sport, curriculum development in physical education, teaching, learning and assessment issues within school physical education, methodological issues in working with young people and ethnography.

Dr. Antonio Calderón’s research interests revolve around student learning in physical education and on social media and digital technologies for learning and engagement in teacher education.

ORCID

Dylan Scanlon http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8774-0532

Ann MacPhail http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1875-0582

Antonio Calderón http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1389-9898

Notes

1 Junior Cycle is the first 3 years of post-primary schooling (typically referred to as 1st–3rd year and covering ages 12–15 years old).

2 Senior Cycle is the last 2 years of post-primary schooling (typically referred to as 5th year and 6th year and covering ages 16–18 years old).