Large-scale cognitive evaluation of content for Physical Education in school

INTRODUCTION. Physical Education in school enables contextualization of physical exercise with themes related to student learning objectives for physical sports, as well as socio-affective and cognitive aspects. However, for this last point, there is a lack of a reference matrix for large scale cognitive evaluation which allows for identification of students' knowledge in relation to the content of Physical Education. Therefore, this study aims to develop and validate a reference matrix (model) for large scale cognitive evaluation of physical education in school. METHOD. The matrix was developed based on the learning objectives of the Curriculum Standards of Physical Education for Elementary School. A total of 232 teachers and researchers of Physical Education in Elementary School (6th to 9th grade) from 5 regions of Brazil participated in the study, which was conducted through a questionnaire, with closed questions and answers and 38 items on a scale. Of the participants, 57.3% were Master's Degree or PhD holders and 42.7% were graduates and specialists. RESULTS. We performed exploratory factor analysis and the results show three factors that were extracted, namely: 1) Socio-cultural Dimension of Body Practices, 2) Bio-Functional Dimension of Physical Activity, and 3) Technical Dimension of Competitive Sports. The sample was adequate for the study (KMO = 0.923, chi(2) = 7644.440. gl = 703, p <= 0.001), satisfactory and explicable total variance was obtained (57.2%) and the internal consistency of the items in these three dimensions was above 0.90, suggesting the accuracy of the results. DISCUSSION. We consider the reference matrix suitable for use as a tool to provide teachers and researchers with indicative dimensions for large-scale cognitive evaluation of the content of Physical Education in Elementary School.