School physical education and disabled students: what about Paralympic sports?

Abstract

ABSTRACT School physical education (PE) has been presented as a privilege for socially dominant groups recognized by their non-disabled bodies. This study aims to investigate the introduction of a 5-week Paralympic sports unit into the PE curriculum as an educational right for disabled students through its recognition as official knowledge representative of their physical abilities and educational right in PE classes. With a poststructuralist perspective, we reflect on dominant discourses on disability in the school PE field and highlight traditional practices and beliefs that pertain to disabled students. Accordingly, we conducted interviews and focus group discussions with one disabled student, his peers and their PE teacher, allowing for the exploration of values, beliefs and practices associated with disability before and after the Paralympic sports unit. Participants’ comments were subjected to interpretative thematic analysis. Paralympic sports enabled the disabled student to recognize and express their identity by critically questioning PE normative practices. Furthermore, Paralympic sports in the PE curriculum was presented as a strategy to raise non-disabled students’ disability awareness rather than as disabled students’ educational right. Paralympic sports constitutes a crucial aspect of the path towards inclusive education grounded in the values of equity and disability identity recognition.