WELCOME

Welcome to our homepage. We are glad that you have chosen to visit us. If you have just stumbled across us, that's great too. Glad to have you on board.

This page is designed to let you know everything about our dynamic research program and the wonderful opportunities afforded graduate students here in the Physical Education Pedagogy program at Auburn University. Follow any of the links on the right column for more information.

Russian Sport Education Project

Oleg Sinelnikov (Doctoral graduate) and Peter Hastie (Professor) have traveled to Russia in the past five years where they spent time teaching and conducting research in three schools. The purpose of the research has been to test the efficacy of the Sport Education model. Seven papers have been published. Posters have been presented at the AIESEP 2005 conference in Lisbon, Portugal, and the AIESEP 2006 conference in Jyvaskyla, Finland,as well as the All-Russian National Conference.

Visual Impairments and Physical Activity Project

Jeanine Wert (Doctoral graduate) and Sheri Brock (Professor) have spent the past two summers in Tucson, Arizona as part of Camp Abilities, a developmental sports camp for children who are blind and visually impaired. While at camp Jeanine served as the Assistant Director, as well as the Aquatics, Rock Climbing, and Tandem Biking Specialist. Consultation data were collected from the campers and camp counselors to provide information for improving Camp Abilities Tucson, which is in its second year of operation. The camp is part of a larger effort founded by Dr. Lauren Lieberman at the State University of New York in Brockport which began in 1996. The theme of Camp Abilities is “A Loss of Sight, Never a Loss of Vision.”  

 Jeanine also spent a week at Camp Abilities Brockport collecting consultation data.

Faculty

We have four full-time tenure track professors within the research group. Full details of their contact, teaching responsibilities, research interests and contact details are available from their individual web pages.

Dr. Peter Hastie (Professor)

Dr. Alice Buchanan (Associate Professor & Program Coordinator)

Dr. Sheri Brock (Associate Professor & Alternative Masters Coordinator))

Dr. Jared Russell (Associate Professor, GTA Coordinator, & Graduate Program Officer)

Our Goal

The goal of our group is three fold:
  1. To produce doctoral graduates who have excellent teaching skills, outstanding research skills and experience, and achievements in publication.
  2. To promote quality research in physical education through the modeling of good practice.
  3. To work as a collaborative of faculty and students to provide the most rewarding learning experience for both groups.

Research Opportunities for Students

Students within our program have significant opportunities to conduct research in a number of settings.
  1. First, we have excellent access to schools, as three of our GTA positions are school-based.
  2. Second, our faculty are active in school and other physical activity settings and are continuously conducting instruction/research at these sites.
  3. Third, students have access to significant funding opportunities through College and Graduate School support. These include, to name a few:
    • Dissertation research funding.
    • Graduate student travel support.
    • Graduate student research symposia.
    • Outstanding access to library resources.

Examples of some of the projects can be seen in the next section.

Our Projects

Current projects being completed within the group include:
  1. Sport Education in Russia (7 papers projected -- Hastie and Sinelnikov)
  2. Visual Impairment and Physical Activity (3 papers projected -- Brock and Wert)
  3. Understanding the culture of minority students (5 papers projected -- Mowling, Brock, Hastie, Gibson and Martin)
  4. Physical Education interventions for students with autism (2 papers projected -- Wert, Brock, Hastie and Simpson)

Our Publications

The papers and books below show the collaborative nature between our faculty and students. Some of our recent and upcoming papers include:

Hastie, P. A., Sharpe, T., Eiler, K. K., Sinelnikov, O. A., Mowling, C. M., & Brock, S. J. (2007) Kounin revisited: Tentative postulates for an expanded examination of classroom ecologies. Journal of Teaching in Physical Education, 26. 298-309.

Hastie, P. A., & Martin, E. H. (2006). Teaching elementary physical education: Strategies for the classroom teacher. San Francisco: Benjamin Cummings.

Hastie, P. A., Martin, E., & Buchanan, A. M. (2006). Stepping out of the norm: An examination of praxis for a culturally relevant pedagogy for African-American children. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 38 (3), 293–306.

Mowling, C., Brock, S. J., & Hastie, P. A. (2006). Fourth grade students’ drawing interpretations of a sport education soccer unit. Journal of Teaching in Physical Education, 25, 9-35.