The Erasmus+ funded project PhysEd-Academy is one of 11 selected projects in the new programme of Teacher Academies. As the only project focusing on the education of future Physical Education (PE) teachers, PhysEd-Academy is a pan-European network consisting of PE teachers (Norway, Turkey, Spain and Sweden), PE teacher educators and teacher education providers (Norway, Spain, Slovenia, Turkey, Ireland, Luxemburg, and Sweden), and 2 European NGOs working with PE and PE teacher education (AIESEP and EUPEA). By bringing together PE teachers and teacher educators from all over Europe, PhysEd-Academy intends to improve the educational quality in PE and PE teacher education through an innovative conceptualization of the processes of teaching and teacher education that challenges the idea of teachers and teacher educators working on different fields and thus identifying new ways of thinking about how teachers and teacher educators can occupy the same space.
The project will directly address current challenges in school physical education (PE) and PE teacher education by improving four imperative quality factors: the purposes and content of PE; school teaching; teacher education; and continuous professional development (CPD). These will be achieved through mobility initiatives between PE teacher education institutions and PE teachers.
PE is the one subject with the potential to provide young people with the skills, attitudes, knowledge, and understanding for a lifelong commitment to a physically active lifestyle and good health. In this way PE contributes to the global priority of decreasing the prevalence of physical inactivity by 15% in 2030. Yet, it fails in its current form. PE is built on old and inefficient traditions that are far from current recommended practices and policies, resulting in PE and teacher education having little or no impact on children and youth. By directly addressing the four quality factors and based on current evidence in PE and teacher education research, practice, and theory, PhysEd-Academy will develop and test innovative strategies and programs for initial PE teacher education and teachers’ ongoing CPD across Europe. This will lead to the development of a set of ‘signature pedagogies’ for learning across different PE teacher education programs, carrying the potential to improv the quality of PE and PE teacher education. The signature pedagogies will be tested by PhysEd-Academy partners in their respective initial teacher education and CPD programs subsequently boosting the attractiveness of the PE teaching profession. PhysEd-Academy is committed to becoming a key actor in improving PE and PE teacher education and will benefit local, regional, and international school PE and teacher education programs.
EUPEA’s role in this important will consist in providing their expertise in all content related work packages. Further on, EUPEA will the work package on dissemination and communication, with the aim to get this project and its results to all PE teacher educators and PE teachers in Europe.
