02/06/2026
WHAT CAN HPE DO BETTER FOR STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES?
Health and Physical Education is meant to be for everyone. However, a new study from Western Australia reveals a troubling gap between that ideal and the reality experienced by students with disabilities.
Researchers Steven Connelly, Dawn Penney and David Aldous at Edith Cowan University surveyed 45 adults with disabilities about their secondary PE experiences and the findings are hard to ignore.
Nearly half felt excluded. 47% said PE activities did not make them feel included, and most reported feeling more included in activities outside of school PE. That's a damning statistic for a subject that champions participation.
Teachers often didn't ask. Almost 50% of participants said their teacher never spoke to them about what support they needed. One participant described walking a lap instead of running it due to undiagnosed asthma, only to receive condescension rather than care. Another spent most of PE sitting on the sidelines — not because no alternatives existed, but because no one thought to offer them.
Power dynamics ran deep. 71% had no choice in which activities they did. Students good at sport were picked first and given agency; students with disabilities were expected to comply or withdraw.
Participants weren't just describing problems: they came with solutions. They want teachers to talk to them, to develop individualised plans, and to pursue professional learning that includes the lived experience of disability.
The message is clear: students with disabilities are experts on their own needs. We need to ask them!
Read the full open-access article from Curriculum Studies in Health and Physical Education here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/25742981.2026.2658526 Taylor & Francis Research
This paper foregrounds the voices of people with disabilities (PwD) and their experiences of Physical Education (PE) in Western Australia (WA) in exploring interests in transgressive inclusion that...
