Physical education for slow learning girls in North Ease schools with special reference to the effect of creative dance on behaviour and friendship patterns amongst adolescent educational subnormal (mild) girls

Abstract

PART 1. The results of a survey in one hundred Secondary and twenty five special schools revealed: (a) Considerable support from headteachers and physical educationalists for the view that physical education can give experience of success to those with a history of failure. (b) Little concern for the desirability of finding appropriate material and teaching techniques designed especially for slow-learning girls. (c) A lack of both proper facilities and appropriate staff in special schools. PART 2. Experimental work was undertaken with four groups of adolescent educationally subnormal (mild) girls from three different schools, one of these groups acting as control. These groups were given: (a) Programmes of 'creative dance’ emphasising both partner and group experience. (b) Sociometric tests before and after the programme. (c) Behaviour assessment tests before and after the programme. As a result of this work the following points emerged: A. (i) The sociometric status of girls in the control group was relatively constant, although those girls of low sociometric status were more strongly rejected in the second test than in the first test. (ii) The sociometric status of girls in one of the experimental groups (^1) from a school with a well established physical education programme was also relatively constant and a reversal of the predicted 'sociodynamic' trend was statistically insignificant. (iii) After a rather more substantial dance programme two other experimental groups showed greater change in sociometric status and the reversal of the predicted 'sociodynamic' trend was statistically significant. B. (i) After behaviour assessment tests, the girls in the control group achieved significantly lower scores in the second test.(ii) The girls in the two experimental groups (as in A. iii) achieved significantly better scores in the second test. (iii) In one experimental group (as in A .ii) changes in behaviour, though positive, were insignificant. Summary In this study there was some evidence that programmes of creative dance led to better behaviour as judged by teachers and to changes in social interaction, as measured by sociometric tests, which could be interpreted as beneficial. 1. This group met together only for physical education and home economics