Phys. Ed. Social Interaction

The hypotheses that is being tested in this study is as follows:

In a mixed (special education students with regular students) physical education class of 6-9 year olds, special education students will initiate social interaction with regular students at a higher level than regular students will initiate social interaction with special education students.

The following study was designed to test this hypothesis.

The subjects of this study consisted of forty 6-9-year-old students in a mixed Physical Education class. The mixture of students included 12 special education students and 28 regular students. The student population consisted of both boys and girls and the mixture represented a variety of socio-economic, cultural, and religious backgrounds.

The study was conducted through direct observation and statistical record-keeping of different measures of socialization skills as witnessed in student interactions during physical education class. The observation and statistics gathering focused primarily on whom among the group initiates interaction in the physical education setting. The study was conducted approximately two or three times per week for one hour intervals over approximately a three month period of time. Statistics were kept based on personal observation during the physical education classes.

. . .
al interaction with regular education students. Following a similar pattern, teachers of regular education initiated social interaction with special education students on a higher level than special education teachers interacted with regular education students. However, the highest level of social interaction occurred among special education students themselves. There were 35 recorded instances of special education students interacting with other special education students compared to the 29 initiations of the next highest interaction cohort, regular education students to special education students. It appears from the results that allowing special education and regular education students to share physical education classes promotes a higher level of social interaction among the different groups. Twenty-nine instances of regular education students interacting with special education students were recorded. It appears that mixed physical education classes allow for increased social interaction, which in turn leads to greater levels of self-confidence, more understanding of different types of people, and an increase in appropriate social behaviors despite physical differences. There are obstacles to achieving the above posit
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1259
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)

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