ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a bird’s-eye view of the landscape of primary and secondary school physical education and the need for a different curriculum conceptual framework. The goal is to give an overview of the status of physical education and the rationale for a new and drastically different conceptual framework. It argues that physical education, as a formal subject matter in K–12 schools, is in a critical transition in which its existence may be threatened due to its marginalization. After a brief summary of historical contributions, the chapter focuses on the current curriculum crisis due to the loss of the educational values of sport-centered physical education programming that alienate most students who do not have athletics aspirations. To revitalize physical education, there is a need for a paradigm change where a learner-centered conceptualization should be formed for a curriculum with a life-course perspective. Based on the ideals of physical literacy, the needed curriculum framework should adopt the monism perspective to place the learner at the center and a health-first approach. The chapter ends with a discussion about the challenges and opportunities for such a physical education curriculum. The information in this chapter serves as the stepstone for the rest of the chapters of the book.
