Teaching outdoor and adventure activities: an investigation of a primary school physical education professional development p

The appropriateness of social constructivism for this study.
Social 
constructivism, in particular, provides a useful and appropriate perspective within which 
to locate this research. Social constructivism is most strongly influenced by the ideas of 
Vygotsky (1978) who sees cognition occurring beyond the body. From a social 
constructivist perspective, cognition is seen not as an individual process but as a 
collective process spread across the individual’s world (Light, 2008). The study school, 
the teachers and pupils that form the basis of the study are viewed as existing within 
society, and this society is situated in time and influenced by history and culture. The 
point here is that knowledge and meaning are created or constructed within a social 
system and through interactions with that system and the people within it. Lincoln and 
Guba (1985) help to clarify this, ‘events or situations are theoretically open to as many 
constructions as there are persons engaged in them, or as many reconstructions by a 
single individual as imagination allows’ (p. 77). Kirk and Macdonald (1998) conclude 
from a social constructivist perspective, ‘learning is an active and creative process 
involving an individual’s interaction with their physical environment and with other 
learners’ (p. 377) or as Davis and Sumara (2003) explain, learning is a complex, 
multifaceted, and continuous process of change that takes place ‘within an evolving 
landscape of activity’ (p. 125). Researchers framing their work within this paradigm 

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also position themselves in the research to acknowledge how their own experiences and 
background can shape how they see the world. This ‘seeing of the world’ can be 
divided into two opposing sets of beliefs or approaches, the objectivist approach or the 
subjectivist approach. The objectivist approach would seek the absolute truth and treat 
that being investigated externally from the individual and employ more traditional 
methodologies based on quantitative methods. The subjectivist approach treats that 
being investigated as a ‘much softer, personal and humanly created kind’ (Cohen, 
Manion & Morrison, 2000, p. 6) and will employ more qualitative based methods such 
as observations and interviews. In taking a subjectivist approach to a study the principle 
concern is ‘with an understanding of the way in which the individual creates, modifies 
and interprets the world in which he or she finds him or herself’ (Cohen et al., 2000, p. 
7). This is further illustrated by Stringer (1996); ‘the aim of (constructivist) inquiry is 
not to establish the ‘truth’ or to describe what ‘really’ is happening, but to reveal the 
different truths and realities – constructions – held by different individual groups’ (p. 
41). This study sought to describe, analyse and understand teachers’ and children’s 
experiences of a contextualised, whole school professional development programme.
The social constructivist paradigm, that permits in-depth understanding that caters for 
an analysis of the truths and realities of all those involved (principal, teachers and 
children) is consistent with the research question and will meet the aim of this study.
Sustained contact by the researcher throughout the study is also legitimised by 
this world paradigm, and this in turn allows a relationship to develop between the 
participants and researcher which will facilitate the collection of rich, in-depth data. It is 
important to note that the researcher is approaching the research not as a philosopher or 
a constructivist theorist but rather as a teacher of physical education. In simple terms, 
the research focuses on what teachers do, why they do it, what they know and what they 
need; and following a programme – what teachers do, why they do it, what they know 
and how (or if) these have changed as a result of being exposed to the programme. The 
study searches for reasons and explanations and assumes that individuals have choices, 
albeit limited choices, and who they are and what they know are as a result of their 
interactions with their world and with others in their world.