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One common practice in talent development environments during the investment years (age 16+) and elite sport, in general, is the use of physiological testing of the athletes’ physical determinants of performance. In this article, the regime of controlling and monitoring athletes’ bodies for elite sport production through physiological testing will be examined. To this end, we explored athletes’ experiences of what has been done and why physiological tests are carried out the way they are to understand the practice of physiological testing in relation to athlete development. The material in this study is based on interviews with adult elite sport athletes (four group interviews with eight individual athletes in three different sports, four male and four female, and individual interviews with twelve female and five male football players). Schatzki's and Reckwitz's theorizing on social practices, together with Dewey's theorizing on learning from experience, are used to explore and illuminate the practice of physiological testing and what learning is enabled and constrained within that practice. The findings show that the meaning and significance of physiological testing for athletic development relates to how the tests are followed up and talked through with the athletes. The analysis shows that there exists a form of sport-wide commonality where the same understandings, rules or ends—irrespective of which sport is concerned—govern coaches’ and athletes’ behavior regarding physiological tests. The physiological testing practice articulates action intelligibility through rules and structures which emphasizes tests as isolated quantified indicators of physical status. The use of physiological tests as a part of learning or as a means for athlete development can therefore be questioned.

Research has shown that a critical teaching perspective is at risk if preservice teachers perceive a gap between university- and field-based courses. This study explores how preservice physical education (PE) teachers make meaning out of their participation in a subject didactics course and the practicum. Interviews conducted across 1 year revealed that preservice teachers experienced PE teaching as practical skills and the advocacy of movement and health during the university-based course but not during the practicum. In both contexts, teaching as didactic and embodied knowledge was perceived as being meaningful. The study suggests that emotional learning occasions, role models, and clear purposes are supportive for a critical teaching perspective.

Scholars have highlighted that physical education teacher education (PETE) reproduce a managerial rather than educational notion of physical education (PE) teacher professionalism. Research grounded in explicit theories of learning can productively contribute to reflective discussions of teaching and learning in PE practices, for example PETE’s role in promoting professional knowledge and critical judgement. The aim of the study is to empirically explore, from a transactional approach, what happens in learning occasions when preservice teachers (PSTs) participate in a PETE subject matter course. The purposive sampling resulted in choosing a group consisting of 24 PSTs (11 female students and 13 male students) studying a course given at one Swedish PETE institution. Data consisted of field notes from participant observations during 28 lessons. A practical epistemology analysis was used to explore how knowledge is produced and reproduced in PETE lessons. Two major themes were found in the analysis: indeterminate situations connected to (a) PSTs developing movement capability and (b) PSTs developing a teacher’s perspective. The indeterminate situations the PSTs noticed, which varied between two types of staged encounters and elements in PETE characterised by a theory-practice dualism, seemed to contribute to certain processes of inquiry but not others. Within both themes, a contextualisation of the covered subject matter and the teacher educators’ use of concepts were important to the direction of the PSTs’ learning processes. An understanding of the role of inquiry, and of how individuals’ prior experience take part in learning processes, are argued to be important in PETE teaching.

Research and quality reports show a relatively unified picture of the school subject physical education (PE) as an educational context in which pupils are at risk of being marginalized or excluded. PE teacher education (TE) has a mission to equip all PE preservice teachers with knowledge and abilities that enable them to teach all pupils based on their individual needs and conditions. In this compilation thesis, I analyze the meaning-making process of becoming a PE teacher. I aim to study meaning-making as intertwined processes of learning and socialization in becoming a PE teacher while transitioning between a university-based and school-based context. The research questions addressed in the thesis include how encounters with PETE and work can be described and understood as well as what meaning-making is enabled and constrained in these encounters. The study employs a transactional understanding of meaning-making and a theoretical framework based on the work of John Dewey and on Occupational Socialization Theory (OST).

The thesis comprises four articles, each emphasizing the individual and social dimensions of meaning-making processes analyzed in relation to cultural dimensions. In Article 1, I explore the challenges novice PE teachers face in Sweden and how they manage these challenges. In Article 2, I examine how PE teachers cope with challenges such as reality shock, marginalization, and isolation as novices and as more experienced teachers. Articles 1 and 2 present interview studies, revealing that the socialization process of PE teachers entering the profession relies more on the individual and on informal collegial support than on formal organizational support. In Article 3, I utilized lesson observations to explore how preservice PE teachers produce and reproduce knowledge when participating in PE TE. Finally, in Article 4, I use a series of interviews conducted over a year to investigate how preservice PE teachers make meaning of their participation in a subject didactics course and the practicum. The results in Articles 3 and 4 indicate that preservice PE teachers struggle to navigate dual purposes in the subject didactics course, namely developing movement capability and didactic capability simultaneously. However, through interactions with teacher educators and supervisors, the purpose of didactic theory becomes more accessible to preservice teachers based on their previous experience.

Overall, the thesis illustrates that continuity and change are two sides of the coin in meaning-making processes. It demonstrates that preservice PE teachers are teacher oriented but require support in contextualizing their experiences. Furthermore, emotional experiences must be conceptualized to prevent teacher knowledge becoming tacit. The results of the thesis underscore that the development of an inclusive teacher perspective is achievable for PE preservice teachers and PE teachers, but they need additional support to cultivate a norm-critical teaching perspective for ensuring an education for all children and youth.

Introduktion: Forskning och kvalitetsgranskningar visar en relativt enad bild av ämnet idrott och hälsa som ett utbildningssammanhang där vissa elever riskerar att marginaliseras eller exkluderas. Hur man än väljer att närma sig undervisning finns det fog för att anta att en av de viktigaste aktörerna i att skapa en tillgänglig lärmiljö för alla elever är just läraren. Idrottslärarutbildningen har ett uppdrag att rusta idrottslärarstudenten med kunskaper och förmågor att efter utbildningen kunna ge alla elever en undervisning utifrån sina behov och förutsättningar. Det är därför av vikt att bilda kunskap om hur, vad, varför och med vem framtida idrottslärare lär för att i förlängningen kunna påverka den undervisning eleverna möter i våra skolor. Jag har i avhandlingen utgått från av en nyfikenhet för hur lärarblivande sker som process i övergången mellan snarare än enbart utfall, samt vad som påverkar denna process. För att en erfarenhet ska transformativ behöver den vara meningsfull för individen och därför är det viktigt att undersöka vad det är som pågår utifrån vad som är meningsfullt för idrottslärare i blivande.

Syfte och teoretisk ram: I avhandlingen används en transaktionell förståelse för idrottslärarblivande grundad i John Deweys och Ludwig Wittgensteins verk. Den transaktionella förståelsen för meningsskapande möjliggör i den här avhandlingen att se tidigare erfarenheter som en viktig utgångspunkt för att kunna studera kontinuitet och förändring i de processer som samverkar i idrottslärarblivandet. Genomgående i avhandlingsarbetet har idrottslärar-/idrottslärarstudentperspektivet varit i fokus.Syftet med avhandlingen är att studera meningsskapande som samverkande lärande- och socialisationsprocesser när idrottslärare i blivande rör sig mellan en universitetskontext och en skolkontext.

Metod: Avhandlingen är uppdelad i tre delstudier. Studieobjektet i delstudie ett är novisa idrottslärare, studieobjektet i delstudie två är idrottslärare som arbetat sex till tio år efter examen från idrottslärarutbildningen och studieobjektet i delstudie tre är idrottslärarstudenter. Avhandlingens empiriska material utgörs av totalt 45 semistrukturerade intervjuer, två gruppintervjuer och 28 lektionsobservationer.

Resultat: Resultaten grundar sig på fyra artiklar, varav tre är publicerade och en är under review.Ett övergripande resultat som framkommer i avhandlingen är hur individerna navigerar sin utbildning eller sitt yrke med hjälp av sina tidigare erfaranden. I mötena med olika människor, kulturer och platser uppstår olika dilemman, motstånd, spänningar och känslor hos individerna. Som ett alternativ till att se övergången mellan universitetskontexten och skolkontexten som en utveckling som sker gradvis i förutbestämda steg, är en utgångspunkt i diskussionen att se idrottslärarblivande som en komplex, icke-linjär process som genomlevs i olika lärmiljöer.

Diskussion och slutsatser: I avhandlingens resultat ses hur de begränsade erfarenheter studenterna har av ett lärarperspektiv på undervisning påverkar vilka meningar studenterna skapar av de ämnesdidaktiska kurserna. Särskilt tydligt blir det i relation till hur studenterna skapar mening i mötet med olika undervisningsmoment som ligger nära eller långt från deras tidigare erfarenheter. Med kunskap om hur meningsskapande processer behöver bygga på tidigare erfarenheter, men samtidigt utmana tidigare förförståelse behöver idrottslärarutbildare noga planera möten med undervisningsinnehåll. Sådana inslag exemplifieras i avhandlingen av rörelseförmåga respektive normkritiskt perspektiv som kunskaper och förmågor en lärare behöver för att kunna främja en undervisning för alla barn och ungdomar. För att möjliggöra ett meningsfullt, reflekterande handlande behöver undervisningsinnehåll som av tradition kallas praktiska respektive teoretiska inslag integreras och vara varandras förutsättningar. I både en universitetskontext och en skolkontext framstår rollmodeller som nyckelpersoner i ett sådant arbete för studenternas möjligheter att skapa relationer mellan tidigare erfarenheter, de möten som görs och de syften som kan urskiljas. Det visar på vikten av att dessa nyckelpersoner förkroppsligar det kritiska undervisningsperspektivet, men även tydligt uppmärksammar studenterna på såväl begrepp som arbetssätt och självreflexivitet, inte minst i arbetet med rörelseförmåga som ämnesdidaktisk kunskap.

There are many factors and duties that novice teachers do not know about when they enter the profession. Isolation, for instance, affects physical education (PE) teachers because the position often comes with a secluded workplace adjacent to the gym and through the subject's marginalization. These challenges, among others, can send the novice teacher into shock, and there is a risk the teacher becomes disengaged from the profession. This study aimed to provide insights into PE teachers’ experiences of reality shock, isolation, and marginalization over time, as well as how they managed these challenges. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine Swedish PE teachers six to 10 years after graduation from PE teacher education (PETE). Qualitative content analysis was used. All participants retrospectively described a reality shock when they were novices, where non-subject-specific teacher assignments were experienced as more challenging compared to teaching PE. Further, isolation had a severe effect. However, the marginalization of PE was not that apparent as when they were novices. Over time, the participants created their own networks to mitigate, for example, isolation. In turn, marginalization seemed to be a remaining challenge to the participants despite an increased societal focus on health. Even though it is impossible for PETE to prepare teachers for every challenge they could face in the profession, PETE should inform preservice teachers of common phenomena such as isolation and marginalization, as well as how to create supporting networks. Further, we argue that perceived autonomy combined with systematic guidance could positively affect novice teachers’ development.

Novice teachers face several challenges during their first years of socialization in schools, often feeling unprepared in managing the full range of teaching duties. If teacher retention and attrition are to be improved, research on the difficulties encountered by novice teachers in diverse contexts and cultures is required. There is a lack of studies regarding physical education (PE) teachers’ induction processes, especially outside Anglophone countries. The aim of this study was, from an occupational socialization perspective, to examine how Swedish novice PE teachers experience, perceive and manage their induction process. Through a single-case study design with embedded multiple units of analysis, we interviewed eight Swedish novice PE teachers. Based on thematic analysis, the results show that Swedish novice PE teachers experience several challenges related to reality shock, marginalization and isolation during induction. We identified three approaches used by the novices as central to successfully managing challenges of induction in the Swedish context: (1) socializing into a community of colleagues, (2) performing the role of the PE teacher as health promoter and (3) maintaining a critical teaching perspective. We conclude that these novice teachers’ socialization relies heavily on the individual, and therefore we argue that the induction process could be further facilitated by formal organizational support. This paper confirms long-standing difficulties reported in other countries, and contributes with new knowledge of how the approaches used when managing challenges of induction are contextually dependent due to the social and political surroundings of education.