AN EVALUATION OF A CONCEPTS OF PHYSICAL ACTIVITY COURSE

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the "Concepts of Physical Education" course at Dordt College and to determine its effect in changing attitudes towards physical education, knowledge concerning physical activity and voluntary physical activity outside the physical education classroom.;A comparison was made between the freshman students enrolled in the concepts course and the freshman students enrolled in the activity courses at the beginning and at the end of each course.;The findings revealed that: (1) the students enrolled in the concepts course showed a mean gain in attitude of 4.11 and the students enrolled in the activity courses showed a mean gain in attitude of -1.22. The calculated t value was 2.41 and was significant at the five percent level; (2) the students enrolled in the concepts course showed a mean gain in knowledge of 2.37 and the students enrolled in the activity courses showed a mean gain in knowledge of .93. The calculated t was 2.57 and was significant at the five percent level.;Based on the study, the following conclusions were drawn: (1) Students enrolled in the physical education concepts course showed a more positive attitude change towards physical activity than did students enrolled in activity courses. (2) Students enrolled in a physical education concepts course showed more gain in knowledge of physical activity than did students enrolled in activity courses. (3) Students enrolled in a physical education concepts course and in physical education activity courses showed a decrease from pre- to post-test in voluntary physical activity outside of the physical education classroom.;Three instruments were selected to investigate the effect of the concepts course; the Kenyon Attitude Towards Physical Activity Inventory was used to measure attitudes, Walker's Knowledge Inventory was used to measure knowledge of physical activity, and the investigator constructed a voluntary questionnaire which was used to measure voluntary physical activity behavior.