Physical Education should excite students, engage them enthusiastically in activities they find meaningful, and eventually help them develop lifelong commitments to physically active lifestyles.
(Siedentop & Tannehill 2000: 130 cited in Penny n.d.)
Since its inception in 1967, physical education in Samoan schools remained unrecognized although structural changes were made to include a health component. In 2004, the Curriculum Statement for Samoa Secondary Schools: Health and Physical Education Years 9 – 13 (Ministry of Education, Sports & Culture 2004) was officially completed. The writing of teacher’s guides for years 9 and 10 (Rasmussen & Sio 2004a) and, years 11 and 12 followed (Rasmussen & Sio 2004b). In 2005, the official implementation of the curriculum began with 2008 being its inauguration as an examinable subject for the Year 12 School Certificate and 2010 for Year 13 Pacific Senior School Certificate (PSSC). The implementation of the Samoa Secondary Schools Health and Physical Education Curriculum is “A peg in the ground” (Stothart 2000: 5) as this marks the long awaited curriculum for Physical Education, and as a subject that has been marginalized for a long time. The Samoan expression alluding to the Biblical verse “O le ma’a tulimanu sa lafoai’ina e tufuga”, the stone that was rejected by the carpenters, has now become the cornerstone (Mark 12:10) seems particularly apt at this time to describe the current developments in this field. Over the years Physical Education had taken second place to the more traditional subjects taught in schools, however, the launch and implementation of Health and Physical Education (HPE) curriculum accelerated the incorporation of HPE into mainstream teaching.
