Many parents do not support physical education because their own school physical education experience followed the “throwing out the ball” stereotype.

The stereotype of the unfit physical-education teacher supervising what amounts to be a recreation period is far too pervasive among the public and educational administrators. It physical education is to become more secure in the school curriculum; it must earn its way.

Many physical educators believe that physical education cannot earn its way except through achieving important outcomes with students.

Students need to become more fit, to know more about fitness, to feel better about themselves and their bodies, to become more skilled, and to be able to participate more successfully and enjoyable in sports.

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At the end of a term in algebra, students can do many things they could not do at the state of the term. The same sense of outcomes must pervade physical education if it is to achieve greater credibility among the lay public and the education profession.

Teaching more carefully and more intensively to achieve outcomes is the big first step that physical education must take if it is to become better established in the school curriculum.

Once that is being more obviously accomplished, then those outcomes must be communicated to parents and educational administrators.