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By: Emma Ross and Megan Elliott

Article Critique

Inclusion Style of Teaching

Learners, with varying degrees of skill development, are able to participate in a task, which is designed on multiple degrees of difficulty.

Learners select a level of difficulty at which they can practice/perform. Entry level decisions and, if necessary, adjustment decisions and self-assessment decisions (guided by specific teacher prepared criteria) are shifted to learners.

No student is excluded from continued participation

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Overview of StudyMrs. Brody(Inclusion Style) Vs. Mr.

Weaver (Command Style) of teaching

Purpose: to determine which style was more beneficial when teaching throwing and batting a ball in baseball

Participants: 48 third grade students from two different elementary schools

Type of study: Observational, one taught with command style and the other with inclusion

Conclusion: Students taught through inclusion style were more likely to perceive success more readily, find the task more meaningful, interesting and challenging, and as a result learn to perform at a higher level

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Style of TeachingInclusion style vs. Command style

of teaching

Inclusion style: Mrs. Brody’s Class

all of her students do the same exercise at the same time, however they choose the level of difficulty of each exercise

i.e. throwing a ball to a partner from a length of 10, 15 or 20 feet

Command Style: Mr. Weaver’s Class

all of his students do the same exercises, the same way, at the same time

i.e. throwing a ball to a partner from a length of 15 feet

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48 third grade children from each elementary school

Mr. Weavers class (command) Mrs. Brody’s class (inclusion)

Number of people participating

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Moderate to vigorous physical activity for 6 minutes is emphasized at the beginning of the lesson, however the study did not indicate exactly what the warm up included.

Mrs. Brody’s P.E Class Warm-Up allowed her students to choose the level of difficulty of

each exercise, whereas Mr.Brody had every student participate at the same level

E.g. Regular push ups or modified push ups dependent on participant comfort level

Mr. Weaver’s P.E Class Warm-Up All participants had to complete a moderate to vigorous

physical activity with all participants completing the task at the same difficulty level

Activity – Warm Up

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Mr. Weaver’s PE Class Instructs his 24 students to throw a small foam

ball to a partner who is standing 15 feet away, 20 times

Observes their performance and provides positive and corrective feedback specific to the skill elements of throwing and catching

Demonstrates new skill of striking the foam ball with a bat several times for students

Students are instructed to return to partners and complete the task within the designated area

Observational Activity

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Mrs. Brody’s P.E Class Reviews major concepts and skills of the previous lesson

of throwing and catching Students have choice of overhand-throwing a small or

medium sized ball to partner who is standing either 10, 15, or 20 feet away, 20 times

Asses their own skill performance with the help of a criteria sheet

Demonstrates new activity of hitting the foam ball (either small, medium, or large) with a bat under 3 different difficulty levels1. From a batting tee2. From a ball underhand tossed from the side by a partner3. From a ball underhand tossed from the front by a partner

Mrs. Brody reviews the critical elements of throwing, catching, and batting by posing questions to her students

Observational Activity

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Design

The design of the study was an observational study where the researchers were observing the differences between the two physical education classes Evident as the study does not include any

procedure or materials section There are also no results that were included in

the study The fundamentals that were specifically being

observed in the study was not included in the research and is added to the study’s limitations

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The conclusions based on this study are all based on assumptions and had no real legitimate evidence or results

Assumptions include: Mr. Weaver’s students level of difficulty met some but not all

of the student’s ability levels More of Mrs. Brody’s class practiced at a skill level that

matched their ability Mrs. Brody’s inclusion style of teaching provided all learners

an opportunity to enter an activity at an appropriate level, either to step backward to a lower level and succeed or to step forward at a higher level and succeed

Students are likely to perceive success more readily, find the task to be more meaningful, interesting, and challenging, and as a result learn to perform a task at a higher level

Overall, students are more likely to enjoy and participate in P.E classes if you incorporate inclusion style of teaching into your lesson plan

What They Found

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The study did not include and abstract, a proper introduction, methods, participation, results and discussion section, decreasing its legitimacy

The researchers did not include a design template with the fundamentals that they were observing for each P.E class

There was no indication of students difficulty level with the task at hand before the students participated in the batting exercise

There was no indication if the researchers presence was known or not throughout the P.E class which can greatly effect the results

All the results that were mentioned to form a conclusion at the end of the study were based off of previous studies that were conducted by other researchers and were implied to this study based off of assumptions.

Critique