ABSTRACT
This chapter illustrates how different socio-cultural factors surrounding the Second World War can come to influence a subject area. It explains how physical education has become positioned within wider ideas of education. The chapter explores that the significance of the secondary sector upon primary physical education before looking at the contested terrains of the 20th and 21st centuries. The influence from secondary physical education towards primary physical education has perhaps been best summed up by the author with the paper entitled 'Physical education: Primary matters, secondary importance'. Globally the aims and values of primary education appear to be driven by two major ideas: child-centred education and social and economic progress. The Plowden Report encapsulated child-centred theories of education enshrined in its maxim "at the heart of education lies the child" and encompassed the philosophies of J. Dewey and J. Piaget.
