Analysis of Corporal Expression in the Degree in Primary Education

Abstract

Corporal expression is a well established component of physical education in Spain. However, there is a historical deficiency in the training that prospective teachers receive in this regard. The standardisation of degrees introduced after the establishment of the European Higher Education Area has led to a credit reduction in the degree in Primary Education, specialising in Physical Education, compared to the previous degree in Teaching, specialising in Physical Education, which may have aggravated the situation described above. The aim of this study was to analyse the current situation in which corporal expression has been included as a training component in undergraduate degree courses at Spanish universities. For this purpose, the syllabuses of the 113 university centres that offered a degree in Primary Education in the 2021/22 academic year were analysed, specifically selecting those subjects that included corporal expression among their contents. The results revealed a lack of training; in some cases training was non-existent, and in others it combined several topics within the same subject, with less than half of the centres offering at least one subject exclusively dedicated to this discipline. Consequently, there was no guarantee of quality training to meet the employment needs of graduates in their future as teachers, at least as far as corporal expression as a physical education content in primary education is concerned.