The philosophy of G Ryle and its significance for physical education

Abstract

Physical education has long suffered low status within educational institutions, due to the assumption that practical knowledge or ‘knowing how’ is somehow set apart from cognitive development and anti-intellectual. This dualistic conception of mind and body is challenged using Ryle’s conceptual account of ‘intelligent performance’, which provides a more positive account of ‘knowing how’ and in the process, dispels with an intellectualist account of education that privileges theory over practice, mental skills over physical skills. Since physical education predominantly deals with practical knowledge, the interest to physical educators is significant, because one’s knowledge of how to do something, in most cases, is a legitimate matter of evaluation. Consequently, to take intelligent performance seriously, we need to be able to ascribe know(ing) how to someone, particularly when we appraise their actions.