Preservice teacher confidence and competence to teach traditional Indigenous games in health and physical education teacher education in Australia

Initial teacher education programmes play a pivotal role in preparing teaching cohorts capable of addressing the diverse needs of all students. The aim of this study was to investigate how Health and Physical Education pre-service teachers perceived their competencies towards teaching traditional Indigenous games and sports material at the required Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership Graduate Standards 1.4 and 2.4. A sample of eleven (male: n = 6, female: n = 5), final year health and physical education specialist pre-service teachers (primary and secondary) participated in the study. Drawing upon Dewey’s philosophy of education, this study provides insights into the preparedness and confidence of pre-service teachers through a mixed-methods approach consisting of an attitude survey to collect quantitative data, whilst a ‘yarning’ methodology was utilised to collect qualitative data. The results suggest that more than 25% of the sample cohort self-reported that they lack preparedness and confidence to meet the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership Graduate Standards 1.4 and 2.4 upon completion of their teaching degrees. Furthermore, the results also suggest that students undertake physical education teacher education programmes with deeply embedded, difficult-to-change beliefs of teaching and learning based upon their own educational experiences.