CHAPTER 2 The Skill Theme Approach 17
Finally, many of these traditional games encourage
only a few youngsters to be physically active. The less
skilled, overweight, or less physically fit youngsters of-
ten find ways to avoid actively participating in games
with one ball or tag games with one person who is “it.”
The skill theme approach was designed with the un-
derlying premise that children have different skill lev-
els and abilities.
What Are Skill Themes?
Skill themes are fundamental movements that form
the foundation for success in sports and physical ac-
tivities in later years. They are also adapted to match
the ability level of the students in a class. Initially we
focus on one skill at a time, and then in later grades
skills are combined with other skills and used in more
complex settings, such as those found in dance,
games, and gymnastics. The intent is to help children
learn a variety of locomotor, nonmanipulative, and
manipulative skills that provide the foundation to
enjoyably and confidently play a sport, for example,
or perform a dance consisting of an intricate set
of movements.
The Curriculum Diamond (Figure 2.1), created by
physical educators Dawn McCrumb and Wendy Mustain
in 1995, is intended to illustrate the concept of a motor
skill foundation leading to successful participation
in sports and physical activities. The model was ex-
panded and elaborated upon by George Graham,
Developing
Expertise
(Grades 9–12)
Exploring
Possibilities
(Grades 6 –8)
Building a Foundation
(Grades Pre-K– 5)
Figure 2.1 The Curriculum Diamond.
Ken Bell, and Catherine Himberg in 1996. The inten-
tion of this model is to help physical educators think
about and design curriculums that will guide young-
sters in the process of becoming physically active for a
lifetime. Grade levels are suggested in the model for
illustration purposes only. Clearly, decisions about
when to introduce different content will need to be
based on the progress made by the students in a given
program (e.g., number of days per week, length of
the classes, equipment, and facilities).
What Is the Curriculum Diamond?
The Curriculum Diamond suggests a curricular focus
corresponding to the grade-level structure of most
school districts across the United States— elementary,
middle, and high school. It follows the recommenda-
tions of the National Center for Chronic Disease Pre-
vention and Health Promotion (NCCDPHP 1997) and
the National Standards for Physical Education (NASPE
2004) by developing a broad foundation at the ele-
mentary and middle school levels and then focusing
on proficiency in a few movement forms at the high
school level. It provides a brief, albeit oversimplified,
answer to the question, How can elementary, middle,
and high school physical education programs work to-
gether to guide youngsters in the process of becoming
physically active for a lifetime?
Building a Foundation (Preschool
through Grade 5)
The bottom part of the diamond represents the earliest
ages at which children are introduced to skill themes
and movement concepts. The initial focus is on devel-
oping a functional (applied) understanding of the con-
cepts of space awareness, effort, and relationships
(Chapters 16 –18). As children develop, they are intro-
duced to skill themes designed to encourage and assist
them in beginning to acquire the fundamental compe-
tencies that will become the foundation skills for many
of the sports and physical activities they will pursue as
adolescents and adults (Chapters 19 –28). You will no-
tice that this section of the diamond widens as each
layer is laid upon the foundational layer that precedes
it. This is intended to represent how skill themes and
concepts are combined in the upper elementary grades.
(Some have suggested that a more appropriate geomet-
ric representation might be a trapezoid. This figure
would suggest that the skill themes and movement
concepts would be wider at the base, the broader foun-
dation, and gradually narrow toward the top. What do
you think?)
18 PART 1 Introduction and Content Overview
Exploring Possibilities (Grades 6 – 8)
In the middle school years, the focus shifts from build-
ing a foundation to using the skills and concepts in a
variety of movement forms. Skills continue to be devel-
oped and learned, but the focus is on exposing students
to wide variety of sports and physical activities designed
to stimulate interest in health-enhancing lifetime ac-
tivities. Ideally this is the age when adolescents begin
to discover the various sports and physical activities
that are, or are not, personally appealing. Some young-
sters, for example, like team sports, and others may
prefer individual sports. Others will enjoy yoga, dance,
martial arts, or mountain biking. The goal is to intro-
duce youngsters to many different movement forms
and then assist them to discover the types of activities
that are personally enjoyable and meaningful.
Developing Expertise (Grades 9 –12)
Ideally the exposure to many movement options in
middle school stimulates student interest in a handful
of health-enhancing lifetime activities. When students
enter high school, the diamond begins to narrow, sug-
gesting that students will begin to make decisions about
the activities they enjoy and desire to become profi-
cient in. At this point students choose electives based
on the possibilities they explored in middle school. As
students approach the peak, the focus narrows. This is
the time when students develop the expertise that en-
ables them to participate in several activities enjoyably
and with confidence, thereby allowing them to accrue
the benefits that come to those who remain physically
active for a lifetime. This is the time when students re-
fine the skill themes and movement concepts they
learned in the early years for use in specific sports and
physical activities.
What Are the Characteristics of the Skill
Theme Approach?
Four characteristics of the skill theme approach (con-
tent and pedagogy combined) clearly distinguish it
from the “primary use of dance, games, and gymnastic
activities . . . considered the traditional ‘activity’ ap-
proach” (Gabbard, LeBlanc, and Lowy 1987, p. 3).
Characteristic 1
Competence in performing a variety of locomotor,
nonmanipulative, and manipulative motor skills is
a major purpose of the skill theme approach.
www.mhhe.com/graham8e
Think of a sport or physical activity you know
well. If you were asked to write a progression (a series
of tasks) starting with novices (beginners) up to var-
sity athletes, you would be able to develop a series of
tasks or drills that would, over a period of years and
with a lot of practice, lead to the students (athletes)
becoming highly skilled in that sport. This is the ba-
sic idea behind the skill theme approach. Each skill
theme begins with the fundamental skills and con-
cepts, is gradually combined with other skills (e.g.,
dribbling while running), and eventually leads to
success and enjoyment in full-sided games (e.g., five-
against-five basketball).
The skill theme approach reflects the growing
concern that some, perhaps many, children who partici-
pate in programs that emphasize game playing rather
than motor skill learning don’t necessarily improve
their motor ability (Graham 1987; Manross 2000). The
logical implication, of course, is that adults with inef-
ficient motor skills tend to avoid physical activities
that require them to use these poorly learned skills and
as a consequence develop tendencies toward “couch
potatoism.” See Box 2-1 for one example of the differ-
ence in outcomes of the two approaches.
A basic assumption is that a curriculum that is
“scoped and sequenced” by skill themes introduces
students to the requisite skills for enjoyably participat-
ing in adult versions of sports, dance, and the myriad
other physical activities that are available today—and
those that will be invented tomorrow. As physical edu-
cators we’re able to help children learn these skills more
quickly and with less frustration than they would if
they attempted to learn the skills on their own.
The skill themes are generic, in the sense that they
are not tied to any single sport or activity. Rather, they
transcend, or cut across, structured sports. As shown in
Figure 2.2, which illustrates a dribbling progression as
might be used in basketball, introductory or beginning
tasks for each skill theme start at the most basic level.
The children are asked to practice the motor skill—
with no defenders, for example—and the fundamen-
tal critical components or cues are emphasized, such as
throwing a ball hard against a wall while focusing on
opposition (stepping with the foot opposite the throw-
ing hand). As children demonstrate the ability to per-
form the skill using the critical components, the tasks
require children to combine the skill with other skills
and concepts, such as throwing while running to a
partner who is also running. When the children are
ready, the skill theme tasks may involve developing
dance and gymnastic routines with their classmates or
playing small-sided games.
Some skills (e.g., jumping and landing) are used in
games, dance, gymnastics, track and field, and so on.