ABSTRACT
In preceding chapters we have presented Sport Education as a pedagogical framework well suited to the development of citizenship and the promotion of inclusion in education, sport and society. We have indicated our own and also government interests in Sport Education having an impact both beyond the school gates and beyond the compulsory years of schooling. This chapter further develops that vision of Sport Education and of citizenship as ‘futures orientated’. It explores the belief that, ‘by encouraging and enabling active citizenship, young people can be drawn into society – at neighbourhood, community and national level – as participants, not just spectators looking from the outside in’ (Hall and Williamson, 1999: 13, our emphasis).
The interesting paradox with Sport Education is that it is modelled on sporting practices and culture, but at the same time actively seeks to present some contrasts to established practices and dominant sporting culture. It also encourages critical reflection on behaviours and practices in sport. There is an underlying interest in the creation of ‘something better’ in sport, such that some of the physically and socially damaging behaviours and attitudes that run through much professional sport, such as stereotyping, elitism or abusive behaviours, may become things of the past, or at least less prevalent. As we explained in Chapter 1, some of the adaptations of Sport Education have specifically brought these social interests to the fore. Yet, Sport Education literature also talks of interests in children becoming ‘initiated into’ and thus serving to ‘sustain’ sporting practices and culture (Siedentop, 1994, 1995). Arguably there is a strong element of conservatism in commentary such as this:
