Materialising physical literacy: rethinking physical education

Abstract

Whitehead (2010) developed physical literacy (PL) as response to narrow conceptions of physical education (PE), placing importance on embodiment and movement as central to how humans are in dialogue with the world. PL was introduced to two primary initial teacher education (ITE) programmes in Scotland as a different way to approach teaching PE. This research builds on Whitehead’s positioning by introducing the work of Spinoza (2002), whose monist perspective entangles more than human – specifically, the material – in worldly practices. My investigation had two aims, the first to find out whether, how and why PL was being enacted by primary ITE students. The second was to invite ways of doing these investigations which chimed with the dynamic nature of PE and PL. Based on a philosophy of immanence, theories of sociomaterialism and posthumanism brought insights into the relations at play as students were becoming teachers. Diffractive thinking informed methodological approaches and analysis strategies by inviting texts, theories, and empirical data, to be read through one another. Somatic practices further fostered analytical thinking with theory-data together, and attendance to emerging differences as actors conjoined. Empirical data came from following three primary student teachers into school placements, and one primary PE specialist, just as COVID-19 restrictions were lifting, which interrupted many practices and also afforded opportunities. Diffractive analyses, guided by posthuman heuristics to unravel translations and trace responses, brought insights into the oftentimes ‘scripted’ activities of education, such as by reimagining lesson plan templates. PL enriches PE by emphasising the affective and an affirmative ethic towards positive health and wellbeing activities. Significantly, this research highlighted the importance of non-humans as affective agents in PL-PE pedagogies as students were becoming teachers. The processes involved in this research also make significant contributions to ways of doing postqualitative inquiry which notices dis-orderly messiness of the world.