Overview
Physical education (PE) provides children with learning opportunities through the medium of movement and contributes to their overall development by helping them to lead full, active and healthy lives. The Physical Education Curriculum provides a balanced range of activities for children and encourages schools to adopt a flexible approach in planning for PE.
Physical Education Curriculum
The Physical Education Curriculum includes six strands:
- Athletics
- Dance
- Gymnastics
- Games
- Outdoor and adventure activities
- Aquatics
The Athletics strand incorporates a range of activities including running, jumping and throwing. These activities provide children with individual challenges and motivate them to participate in more formalised approaches to athletics in later stages of physical development.
Dance in the Physical Education Curriculum encourages children to improve body management skills, to understand movement, to work with others and to develop creativity and imagination.
Gymnastics focuses on body actions such as jumping, turning, swinging and balancing. This strand is also concerned with the control and management of body movements in increasingly challenging situations.
Involving children in games enables them to appreciate and enjoy games both as participants and as spectators.
The outdoor and adventure activities strand is a new aspect of the curriculum. Schools can plan for walking, cycling, orienteering and other outdoor challenges suited to children's needs, interests and circumstances.
The aquatics programme involves not only teaching children how to swim but promoting children's enjoyment of water-based activities also. The curriculum stresses the importance of play in the development of competence in the water.
Current Status
National in-service for the Physical Education Curriculum began in schools during the 2004/2005 school year and continued into the 2005/2006 school year. This was followed by formal implementation in primary schools supported by the Cuiditheoireacht service provided by the Primary Curriculum Support Programme (PCSP). The advisory service of the Primary Professional Development Service (PPDS) continues to provide support to teachers and principal teachers on implementation.
Documentation
Physical Education (PE) Curriculum (Primary Curriculum Online) (1999)
Physical Education (PE) Teacher Guidelines (Primary Curriculum Online) (1999)
View and download PDF format of these documents:
Physical Education (PE) Curriculum (1999) (PDF, 327KB)
Physical Education (PE) Guidelines (1999) (PDF, 3.1MB)
Publications
Related links
Primary Professional Development Service (PPDS)