Scheduled for Pedagogy and Special Populations Posters, Thursday, April 1, 2004, 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM, Convention Center: Exhibit Hall Poster Session


Effects of an Experiential Education Model on Alienation

Sinah Goode and Nancy Burkhalter, Texas Woman's University, Denton, TX

A landmark study by the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports Report indicates that participation in physical activity can assist adolescents in avoiding potential problems and lay the foundation for a healthier adult life. Two significant findings of the Surgeon General’s report on physical activity behaviors of high school students were (1) approximately one-half of American young people ages 12-21 regularly participate in vigorous physical activity and one-fourth report no vigorous physical activity, and (2) only 19 percent of all high school students are physically active for 20 minutes or more in daily physical education classes. Even though physical education is a logical venue for providing an opportunity for increased activity levels, there is a lack of participation in vigorous activity during physical education. One important factor found to be associated with decreased participation is alienation (Calabrese, 1984; Carlson, 1995). Accordingly, it is prudent to discover curriculum models that are effective in reducing feelings of alienation thus resulting in increased participation. One model that has the potential to decrease alienation is the experiential education model. This curriculum engages adolescents in activities that build the skills, confidence, and practices for making positive choices. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of an experiential education curriculum model on levels of alienation from physical education in high school students. In this study, two intact physical education classes from two different high schools were used (N=30). During the 9-week session, the experimental group participated in daily physical education using an experiential low/high ropes curriculum twice a week and a traditional sport/activity-related curriculum three days a week. The other high school physical education class was involved in a traditional sport/activity-related curriculum daily throughout the 9-week session. To measure alienation, the students were given a pretest/posttest of a Physical Education Survey (Burkhalter & Lee, 1996). Results indicated there was a significant interaction between schools in the alienation pre- and posttest scores, F (1, 28 = 4.849, p<.05). At the conclusion of the 9-week period, the experimental group showed significantly lower levels of alienation when compared to the students in the traditional physical education class. This study suggests the experiential model can decrease levels of alienation. Since the literature clearly links decreased levels of alienation with increased physical activity participation, these results support incorporating the experiential model into high school physical education curriculum.


Keyword(s): alternative programming, curriculum development, high school issues

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