The Effects of an Appropriate Behavior Program on Elementary School Children Social Skills Development in Physical Education.

The purpose of this study was to see the effects of an appropriate behavior development program in relation to the improvement of fair play and social skills behaviors of elementary school children during the physical education class. The participants of this study were 204 students from 5th and 6th grade from seven different public schools in Castilla-La Mancha, Spain. Data was collected through a questionnaire to measure students' pre and post appropriate behaviors when winning, appropriate behaviors when loosing, appropriate behaviors during the game, fair play skills and social skills, during the physical education class. Results from this study revealed that participants improved their behaviors with the implementation of the intervention (appropriate behavior program), generating positive changes in students' attitudes and social skills during physical education class. In relation to children gender, girls had better scores than boys in relation to appropriate behaviors when losing. Further, when comparing students' age, those from 10 to 11 years old scored higher in fair play behaviors and social skills. In conclusion, the intervention program was effective to improve the behaviors of the school children, generating positive changes in their attitudes and social skills during physical education.

Perceptions and practices of adapted physical educators on the teaching of social skills.

The purpose of this study was to determine adapted physical educators' perceptions and practices about teaching social skills to students with disabilities. A questionnaire based on Bandura's social learning theory concept of modeling was developed and mailed to an entire frame of 426 adapted physical education teachers in the state of Ohio. Face and content validity as well as test/retest reliability (0.89) were established. Of those that were surveyed, 53% (225 teachers; 148 females and 77 males) responded. Results indicate that 93% (209) believe it is important to explicitly teach social skills in PE; however, 60% (135) expressed not feeling properly prepared to teach them. Teachers with more than 20 years of teaching experience were more likely to actually teach social skills. When compared with other teachers with less years teaching, however, they identified a greater need for training in the teaching of social skills. Results are discussed relative to teacher preparation and practices as well as social skills taught for general education and community integration.