DOES GENDER HAVE AN IMPACT ON PHYSICAL EDUCATION TEACHERS’ STATUS AS ROLE MODELS?

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate whether Physical Education teachers are role models to their pupils, and whether the gender of the teacher impacted their status as a role model. It focused specifically on the extent to which male teachers can become role models to female students, and similarly the extent to which female teachers can become role models to male students. Six male and six female participants, in the final year of G.C.S.E. P.E. took part in focus groups. The focus groups were divided by gender and the participants discussed both their male and female teachers, and their perceptions of them. The study discovered that female pupils selected male teachers as their role models, to equal measures as they selected their female teachers. It also discovered that the male pupils did not consider their female teachers to be role models to them in anyway, and focused exclusively on their male teachers and the qualities they possessed.