III. NOTAS EXPLICATIVAS
27. Gestión de Riesgos
Table 4.5 shows the relationship between achievement in Critical Thinking in Health and Physical Education and Attitude to Health and Attitude to Physical Education using the Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient (r). Overall, the relationship was relatively weak, although statistically significant (p<.01) for health at Year 8 and for physical education at Year 4.
Table 4.5 Correlations between Attitude to Health, Attitude to PE and Critical Thinking in Health and PE
at Year 4 and 8
Attitude to Health with Critical Thinking in Health and PE (r) Thinking in Health and PE (r) Attitude to PE with Critical
Year 4 -0.02 0.11*
Year 8 0.16* 0.04
* statistically significant at (p<.01)
Figures 4.7 to 4.10 show how groups of students with lowest, middle, and highest attitude scores achieved on the health and physical education measure at Year 4 and Year 8. To construct these graphs, three reporting groups were defined on the basis of the Attitudes to Health and Physical Education scale scores: the lowest group of students was made up of students in the bottom quartile of scores on the Attitude to Health and Attitude to Physical Education scales; the middle group represented the students who scored between the 25th and 75th percentile; and the highest group represented the students who scored in the upper quartile.
Tables 4.6 and 4.7 show the differences in average scores on Critical Thinking in Health and Physical Education between the three Attitude to Health and Attitude to Physical Education score groups for Year 4 and Year 8 students. An effect size related to each difference is also reported.
Although the relationship between attitude and achievement was weak, lowest attitude groups in both health and physical education achieved at a lower level than highest attitude the groups at Year 8, and in physical education at Year 4 also. These differences could be due to the different priorities given to health and physical education at the different year levels, the changes in attitude between Year 4 and Year 8, or to other factors not considered in this study.
Figure 4.7 Year 4 student achievement scores
Table 4.6 Year 4 students: Differences in average achievement by level of Attitude to Health/Attitude to PE Critical Thinking in Health and PE with Attitude to Health Critical Thinking in Health and PE with Attitude to PE
Difference
(scale score units) Effect Size (scale score units) Difference Effect Size
Lowest/Middle 0 0.01 -7 -0.33
Middle/Highest 0 -0.02 0 0.01
Lowest/Highest 0 -0.01 -7 -0.32
Effect sizes in bold are statistically significant (p<.05)
Figure 4.9 Year 8 student achievement scores by
level of Attitude to Health Figure 4.10 Year 8 student achievement scores by level of Attitude to PE
Table 4.7 Year 8 students: Differences in average achievement by level of Attitude to Health/Attitude to PE
Critical Thinking in Health and PE with Attitude to Health Critical Thinking in Health and PE with Attitude to PE (scale score units) Difference Effect Size (scale score units) Difference Effect Size
Lowest/Middle -3 -0.15 -1 -0.06
Middle/Highest -4 -0.20 -2 -0.08
Lowest/Highest -7 -0.35 -3 -0.15
2. Opportunities to learn health and physical education at school
As part of the student questionnaire students were asked to rate how frequently they were involved in a range of health and physical education learning experiences at school. The results that are presented in this report are for the specific range of opportunities that students were asked about. These were broad categories of opportunity and students answered using a response scale that ranged from ‘Not at all’ to ‘Heaps’. (See Chapter 2 for details on these statements).
Figures 4.11 and 4.12 show how frequently students in Year 4 and Year 8 reported being involved in a range of health activities. Year 4 students reported higher frequencies of learning opportunities than Year 8 but with the same pattern of response. Almost 70 percent of students said that they frequently took action to improve their health after learning something about health in class, and that they learned something that was important to them. A smaller proportion (40 to 50 percent) reported frequently doing whole class activities in health, sharing things they learned with others, and working in groups to think about and discuss things in health. Very few students at Year 4 or Year 8 (4 to 7 percent) reported never learning something that was important to them in health or never taking action to improve their health after learning something in class.
Figure 4.11 Frequency of health activities reported by Year 4 students
Overall students reported a high level of learning opportunities in physical education at both year levels. Reports by Year 4 and Year 8 students were very similar overall, suggesting that physical education activities were experienced at similar frequencies at both year levels. About 80 percent of Year 4 and Year 8 students reported frequent opportunities to learn new skills and different ways of moving; how to be safe when moving in different ways; about playing fair; working in teams or groups; and using equipment to play and move around. Year 8 students reported slightly more team or group work activities than Year 4 students. Only one to four percent of students at either year level reported never having these learning opportunities. About 60 percent of Year 4 and 50 percent of Year 8 students said they had frequent opportunities to make up movement patterns or solve movement challenges. Eight to nine percent of students at both year levels said they never had these opportunities.
Figure 4.13 Frequency of PE activities reported by Year 4 students