<b>Promoting Quality Physical Education in Korea: </b>

Abstract

There have been strong initiatives to improve school physical education (PE) in Korea over the last decade. The purpose of this presentation is to provide an overview of efforts to improve school PE in Korea. The efforts to improve school PE have been pursued by strengthening regular PE classes as well as activating school sport clubs (SSCs) during after-school hours and weekends. First, the national curriculum of physical education (NCPE) which was revised in 2011 is characterized by teaching physical activity values (i.e., health, challenge, competition, expression, and leisure), creativity and character, and teaching life skills as well as physical skills (Ministry of Education, 2011). Promoting children’s healthy and active lifestyle was one of the crucial goals of the NCPE. The changing forces of society such as emphasis on children’s social development due to increase in school violence and violence-related student suicide worked as opportunity to strengthen the status of PE within school curriculum. Therefore, the PE classes have increased from 3 to 4 hours per week (including one hour of school sport club activity) in middle school, and the new employment of PE teachers has been increased last five years. Another approach to improve school PE has been pursued by activating school sport club (SSC) and beforeand after-school physical activity programs. The presentation will deal with what factors were influencing promoting SSCs in Korea and how they impacted on students’ health, education, and sport skill improvement (Choi, Ahn, & Lee, 2014). Specifically, the current implementation status of SSCs in Korea and students and teachers’ perceptions of the SSCs will be shared. In addition, evaluation studies on the impact of SSC participation on students’ positive youth developmental construct will be shared (Fraser-Thomas, Cote, & Deakin, 2005). Finally, the presentation will be concluded by sharing achievement and challenges for the decade and provide future directions for research and practice.