Prospective Teachers' Perspectives of Physical Education and Sport

Abstract Occupational socialisation research within the teaching profession is typically divided into three separate stages: recruitment, professional education, and entry into the work place. The beginning phase, also known as anticipatory socialisation, assumes that people who choose to enter teaching have already formed a perspective about the profession. Teaching is particularly susceptible to such perspectives as students spend at least 12 years of their lives observing and interacting with teachers before they enter a tertiary institution. The recruitment phase of socialisation is considered important because it affects the rest of the socialisation process. It is important to know what perceptions and experiences prospective physical education teachers have about physical education and sport before they start their professional training. This study examines the perspectives that recruits joining a training programme bring with them and compares the results with previous research findings in the are...