Mainstream PE Inclusion

Including young disabled people in mainstream PE

The Youth Sport Trust, the UK’s leading children’s sport charity, has a mission to build a brighter future for young people through PE and sport.  This area of work focuses on the development of PE for children with special educational needs and disabilities in mainstream schools. 

We have worked with six mainstream secondary schools from across the UK to create a series of short videos to demonstrate how they have developed inclusive PE for their young disabled pupils.  Each school has taken a different approach, based on pupil need and has developed their work over a number of years.  Five key themes, each critical to success, are included: passion, knowledge, communication, innovation and deployment.

The starting point is the approach of the PE staff.  Success can only be created through a passionate PE team that is committed to changing its approach to Physical Education. 

This must be combined with a detailed knowledge of the young disabled people.  How they perform physically and cognitively and what engages and inspires them in PE.  This information must then be communicated with Special educational needs and senior leadership teams to ensure a whole school approach. 

The final steps are to design an innovative curriculum and deploy learning support staff effectively to maximise pupils learning and progress in PE. 

Each of these six schools have used different activities to progress pupil learning.  Staff demonstrate a variety of teaching and learning styles to enhance pupil understanding, and teaching assistants play a proactive role in all lessons.  Disabled pupils learn with their non-disabled peers in a way that raises standards in Physical Education for all young people. 

The schools have embedded a 5-step process resulting in a more inclusive PE curriculum to the benefit of all staff and pupils.  Planning and reviewing the curriculum is ongoing and is adapted as disabled pupil’s progress in lessons and teaching and learning has improved.  This is best expressed by the number of young disabled pupils taking accredited qualifications. 

The development of inclusive PE has had a significant impact across the whole school with disabled pupils showing higher levels of well-being, engagement and physical stamina – resulting in an increase in their attainment and achievement.  Disabled pupils, within each of our six schools now have a more active role in school life. 

Click here to view videos