One of the problems faced by primary school teachers in teaching the subject of physical
education (hereafter PE) in the first educational cycle is the proper organizational planning of
PE lessons in such a way as to use a large number of sports equipment and at the same time
spend as little time for preparations and tidying. This problem is especially pronounced in
polygons, relay games and training at stations, which are very popular and often used in the
first educational cycle, but also require more time to prepare and tidy up the gym. This
segment of the lesson requires some thoughtful organizational steps from teachers to prepare
the gym with students quickly and safely. It often happens that due to the teachers’ poor
organization students are most deprived of the time that could be devoted to practice in the
above-mentioned activities. The purpose of this master's thesis was to identify how class
teachers in the first educational cycle most often organize the preparation and tidying up of
the gym and to what they pay the most attention. The online questionnaire was completed
by 94 class teachers from all over Slovenia who taught PE in the first educational cycle in the
school year 2019/20. The results of the research showed that teachers most often write down
the way of changing groups in organizational preparation and sketch the layout of props and
equipment. Teachers most often give oral instructions to students for preparing and tidying
the gym, and they also actively participate in carrying the props. Most class teachers estimate
that the process of preparation and cleaning takes on average 6–10 % of the total lesson time.
On average, teachers involve 80 % of the students present in the PE lesson. Most teachers also
include excused students who do not have health restrictions in this process. During this time,
other students are most often waiting unorganized for their classmates to complete a given
task. We have found that when giving instructions for preparing and storing props, teachers
very often or often say what needs to be prepared/tidied up, who needs to do it, and what
students need to do when they complete a given task. Most students have very often or often
access to the sports equipment storage room for the purpose of preparing and tidying up the
gym, and according to the teachers, the students also know the storage order of equipment
very well or well.
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