Playmakers Basketball Development League as Physical Education Curriculum

For someone who played and loved sports as a child,basketball in a small gym with a large class and
I never really liked my P.E. classes. P.E. classes neverprevents numerous players from sitting out at any
seemed like real sports. Apparently, I am not alone.time. The PBDL teaches basic skills using a game-play
In an article titled "Student Activity Levels During amodel, enabling beginners and experienced players to
Season of Sport Education," Peter A. Hastie andplay the game together.
Stewart G. Trost write (Pediatric Exercise Science,If a physical education teacher uses a block practice
2002):instruction model for basketball, the teacher may
Sidentop has suggested that most sport withinfocus on a simple skill like lay-ups or dribbling the
physical education rarely reproduces those featuresbasketball on the first day, but knowledge of lay-ups
of sport that lead to its attractiveness, resulting indoes not enable one to play a game or join
student claims of irrelevancy and boredom.confidently into a scrimmage. However, through a
In the paper, the intervention measures thegame-play model like the PBDL, beginners learn new
effectiveness of using a more sport or team-orientedskills like dribbling the basketball and making lay-ups
approach to physical education which Sidentopwhile engaged in actual game-like play.
called Sport Education; essentially imagining the blockA P.E. teacher has two goals: (1) increase physical
of time devoted to one sport as a mini-season. Theactivity (fitness) and (2) teach/develop sport-skills.
intervention found that Sport Education can produceThe concept of Sport Education enables instructors
sufficient levels of moderate-vigorous activity, whileto meet these goals simultaneously, and
not discriminating against lower-skilled players.thePlaymakers Basketball Development League is a
The Playmakers Basketball Development Leagueplanned, organized six-week curriculum that uses the
offers an ideal Sport Education curriculum for thesame ideas as Sport Education as a means for
basketball lesson of a physical education class.player development, learning and fun with youth
The PBDL addresses the difficulties of playingbasketball players.