Forum theatre in physical education teacher education as an approach to battle racism among students

This study aimed to develop knowledge on how to incorporate critical pedagogy and forum theatre (FT) into physical education teacher education (PETE) to empower pre-service teachers to address anti-racism in physical education (PE). FT, inspired by Freire's critical pedagogy, is a form of participatory theater in which audience members are invited to join the performance, share perspectives, and initiate change through dialog, physical action, and reflection. This study used an action research methodology and involved 54 pre-service teachers at a university in Norway. The empirical material includes individual written reflection logs by pre-service teachers, a transcript of the recorded FT play, and transcripts from two group interviews and one full-class oral reflection held after the project. The findings indicate that the pre-service teachers generally enjoyed working with FT and highlighted the embodied nature of the learning experience. A key insight is that pre-service teachers typically understood racism as individual acts. Few pre-service teachers expressed an understanding of structural racism in PE, and some questioned whether addressing racism falls within their responsibilities as PE teachers. The results demonstrate the need for PETE faculty to better address racism at different levels, and how Whiteness impacts pre-service teachers’ willingness to address contours of racism. Our long-term objective of integrating FT as a pedagogical strategy in PETE is to cultivate students’ awareness of mechanisms of oppression within PE and to equip them with strategies to address these in their future roles as PE teachers.