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ABSTRACT
Movement integration is an interdisciplinary method of teaching that may lead to greater student learning outcomes and long-term knowledge acquisition. The perspectives of classroom teachers and preservice teachers toward the use of integrated movement lessons in the elementary classroom and the impact on student content retention were explored in this study. Results highlight the relationship between integrated and traditional formats, suggesting that movement integration may be a beneficial strategy as the teachers perceived students to be interested, engaged, and learning.
As teachers aim to deliver more content to students each year, they seek innovative teaching activities to help students remain attentive to the lessons and increase their retention of content knowledge. Activities that engage students' interest may lead to greater student learning outcomes and long-term knowledge acquisition (LeFevre et al., 2013); and Norris, Shelton, Dunsmuir, Duke-Williams, and Stamatakis (2015) explain that a growing body of evidence indicates that physical activity in the classroom can benefit both health and academic performance for children. The academic benefits of content-related physically active lessons in the K-12 classroom is an underexplored area, eliciting an opportunity to improve the learning environment and the accrual of physical activity.
Movement integration has traditionally been defined as any type of physical activity infused into normal classroom time, including academic lessons that incorporate physical activity, short physical activity breaks, and physical activity during transition periods (Webster, Russ, Vazou, Goh, & Erwin, 2015). Previous research establishes that teachers perceive many barriers to integrating movement (Fletcher, Mandigo, & Kosnik, 2013; Howie, Newman-Norlund, & Pate, 2014; Vazou & Skrade, 2014), but emerging evidence offers that classroom teachers may be partial to movement integration activities if the lessons are connected to the academic content (McMullen, Kulinna, & Cothran, 2014). Providing students with interesting lessons may lead to greater sustained attention, which may help students to commit concepts to their long-term memories (Hidi, 1990). This study focused on physically active academic lessons, which integrate physical activity into academic content, contributing to a child's physical activity during the school day.
The primary aim of this exploratory study was to examine teachers' and preservice teachers' perceptions on the effectiveness of using integrated movement lessons in the classroom. Furthermore, the effect of the intervention on students' concept retention was assessed...