The Lionesses, the Wish and the Worrisome

Written a few days after England won the UEFA Women’s Euros, this blog follows closely on the publication of our recent post, marking the 10 year anniversary of the London Olympics and Paralympics. It expands on some of the same themes, in particular, the difficult relationship between elite sport, PE and youth participation. 

To support practitioners, we have produced a FREE resource to signpost to what we consider to be high quality resources for teachers or coaches, be they new to teaching football or experienced practitioners looking for fresh ideas. 

The Lionesses 2-1 victory against Germany was associated with so many positives: the competition drew record-breaking crowds but it wasn’t only the numbers that were noteworthy. It was so refreshing to see football crowds made up of men, women and children, especially young girls. For women to dominate the sport media is still rare. The fact that it is noteworthy highlights the extent that sport remains male dominated but we should ‘take the win’. Chloe Kelly’s iconic celebration was articulately summed up in this Tweet

Although let’s not pretend decades, if not centuries of misogyny and objectification evaporated on Sunday 31 July 2022. A friend of mine tweeted this:

It’s probably fair to say that success in elite sport is always over-celebrated and the positives exaggerated whilst failures are over criticised. Wins are presented as brilliantly planned and executed. Good fortune tends to be overlooked. What constitutes success or failure is narrowly framed and this often does more harm than good as explained in 3 time Olympian, Cath Bishop’s, highly acclaimed book, The Long Win.

Following Leah Williamson raising the trophy, the press and social media has been filled with stories and prophecies about the impact of the victory. Attention has turned to legacy and an expected surge in the number of girls playing football, and the role of PE. 

There are always lots of assumptions in the way these stories play out. It is always interesting who is wheeled out to talk on matters of youth participation. Good Morning Britain turned to ex (male) (and not particularly well known) professional footballer, Darren Eadie to talk about the benefits and status of physical education. Irrespective of what he said, Eadie follows the likes of Beckham and Holmes as elite sportspeople who present as PE experts. I’m genuinely not sure how many lessons they’ve taught between them (although I would rate Kelly Holmes' attempt on theTeachers TV (2015) as comparable with a confident beginner teacher early in their ITE). In fairness, ITV in East Anglia did turn to PE teacher and footballer, Hayley Wood Thompson, for a brief interview. However, much of the coverage focuses on the aforementioned, narrow success criteria and talk of pathways to County and Academies. By its very nature, the pyramid structures that have dominated youth sport for so long, can and will only serve a minority. The Lionesses are the epitome of this system so when their success prompts conversations about PE and youth sport, tensions and confusion are inevitable. 

As highlighted in our blog on the Olympic legacy, elite sport does not have a good track record of impacting on sustained youth participation. The Wimbledon effect has long been acknowledged when tennis courts are more crowded in the fortnight during and following the All England Championship but it’s much easier to get a park court a month after when the wave of enthusiasm has died down. 

At the time of writing, the Lionesses have published an open letter to the prospective Prime Ministers. They declare that “they want every young girl in the nation to be able to play football. Currently only 63% can play football in PE.” 

When it comes to what should or shouldn’t be taught in PE, I’d welcome comments justifying why one activity has higher intrinsic and/or educational value than another. Why should every girl learn in and through football in PE? Is there a case for football over gymnastics, swimming, contemporary dance, boxing, kabaddi, rock climbing, table tennis, weight lifting or any other activity you care to mention? If the issue is gender parity, i.e. girls being denied access to something that boys have, then, to be honest, it’s sad that this is still even a conversation. But football for girls (or boys) seems to have no greater claim to be covered in PE than Jane Austen has to be compulsorily included in the English curriculum. Austen may well be great but then so too is Salmon Rushdie. Curriculum design is complex and should be made by professionals who think deeply about what learning experiences are more likely to support young people attain the curriculum aims which is essentially to help young people form a positive relationship with physical activity so that they want to do it on a regular basis. (See our Introduction to Impact PE for a fuller discussion on this.) Football may or may not help achieve this. 

So what needs to happen if we are to move beyond the headlines and media hype and arrive at a position where more girls have sustained levels of engagement (in football)? I invite your thoughts on what you see as your priorities. I suggest 3 broad areas. 

1. Broaden our definition of success 
2. Support teachers and coaches
3. Keep asking difficult questions and challenging our thinking on inclusion
   
   1. Broaden our definition of success 

Claire Daniels is National Innovation Manager at the FA and presents brilliantly on different rationales for young people engaging in football (applicable to any activity). They are to learn, for fun or to compete. This helps us overcome the long standing debate about the demarcation between PE, Sport and Physical Activity that serves to alienate physical educators and make us appear aloof. The debate has reared it head again in the current media furore. It’s much easier to take Claire’s first point and agree that if there’s a responsible adult working with young people it’s always primarily about learning and development. Fun is insufficient as a standalone aim and competition should never be divorced from learning in PE or youth sport. A developmental approach, therefore, only has one success criteria - the young person developing (and being able to articulate that development) in one or more domains of learning.

Winning, defined by beating someone else, is difficult to justify as a primary outcome for those of us who are genuinely aiming for long term participation.  It's probably a positive thing that the Lionesses have highlighted these matters (again) but it's difficult not to conflate success in PE and youth sport with success in elite sport when the conversation is being led by (well-meaning) elite sports people precisely because they won!

It is widely acknowledged that this is a confusing and contested space. The conflation of elite sport with PE, as touched upon above, is one of the main sources of confusion and it’s a big ask for teachers, especially non-specialists or beginners to be able to deliver inclusive, developmentally appropriate lessons. To help with this, we have prepared this resource signposting to some exceptionally good resources. They all have a number of factors in common:

• They approach learning holistically - the attitudinal/affective and thinking (decision-making) domains are given as much attention as the movement (physical) domain. 
• They tend to use small sided game or play based activities for learning much of the time
• The activities are aligned to clear learning outcomes
• The activities are easily adapted to cater for young people at different stages of development
  
  
  3. Keep asking difficult questions and challenging our thinking on inclusion

Let’s talk about the elephants in the room. All the talk about girls football implies girls are a homogenous group. The England women’s team is the polar opposite of the England men’s team in at least two glaringly obvious ways: it is less diverse when it comes to race and more diverse with regards sexuality. This is the case with a number of high profile team sports - Rugby, Cricket and Hockey. Interestingly England/GB women in all these sports have had a lot of international success in recent years which has not led to a sustained increase in participation levels amongst girls. So there seems to be a lot of work to be done to attract and retain girls from minoritised communities into these sports. It is perhaps even more challenging to support young people break free from constraining, traditional constructs of femininity and masculinity so that more young people feel free to move in any way they wish.

Youth sport and PE have many serious inclusion challenges. Young people with special needs and disabilities remain left behind and often left out. This, of course, includes boys and girls. The cost of participation can be prohibitive for children living in precarity (Kirk, 2021). And finally, the gendered discourse post Euros is entirely binary. Just because the national and international governing bodies of sport are grappling to include (or otherwise) athletes who identify as Trans or Non Binary, does not mean that schools can’t lead the way in creating safe, inclusive environments so all young people can use sport and physical activity to have a better life. Indeed, Simon Scarborough’s work at Crispin School, Somerset, highlights what can be done when awareness, compassion and sensitivity are at the forefront of decision-making. 

We should never forget that young people sit at the heart of this. miMove has multiple benefits that are relevant here: the ease in which practitioners can capture student/athlete voice and the evidence that it provides. Student voice can be used by teachers/coaches to enhance the quality of the experience, increasing the likelihood of retention. miMove also captures unprecedented participation data. Nothing would give us greater pleasure than to log into our system this time next year to see clear evidence of a significant increase in the number of girls taking part in football (as well as other physical activities). Aspirations are great. Let's see if this time, we can deliver.

References

Bishop, C. (2020) The Long Win,. The search for a better way to succeed. Practical Inspiration Publishing, London

Kirk, D. (2021) Precarity, Critical Pedagogy and Physical Education Routledge, London

Teachers TV (2015) viewable at https://youtu.be/Hq12tSOvT_A