Critical storytelling as a teaching strategy in physical education teacher education

Stories capture the richness and nuances of meaning in everyday existence and give insight into the complexity of our experiences and understandings. They can evoke an emotional response in the reader, which moves them beyond the literary experience to a more ‘lived’ and embodied experience. This article is concerned with autobiographical narrative in the form of story and its influence on the development of a critical pedagogy in physical education (PE). Girls’ stories of physicality were presented to training PE teachers as a strategy to foster critical and inclusive approaches to the teaching of PE. Student teacher responses indicated that much of the power of the strategy lay in the understanding that the stories came from ‘real people’. In promoting both emotional and embodied connections to the storyteller, empathy was enhanced. The stories served to highlight for student teachers the importance of noticing what was happening for girls in their classes, the public display of the body in PE and the need for particular pedagogies that ensure learner safety.