(CZ) Závislost vývoje školní tělesné výchovy na ekonomických, ideově politických a kulturně školských poměrech
(EN) How the Development of Physical Training at Schools Depends on Economic, Ideological, Political and Cultural Conditions in Education

The modern call for all-round education arises with the emergence of the bourgeois society. Its advocates are mainly the philanthropists, but the introduction of P. T. into schools is also demanded by teachers and patriotic clergymen. The demand for introducing P. T. as a regular subject into schools makes itself felt very strongly in the revolutionary year in connection with the proposals for a school reform. But the influence of Herbartian pedagogy and the conservatism of parents and many teachers as well, act as a delaying factor. Real progress is made as late as 1869, when the Austrian system of education is reorganised. P. T. is introduced into the Primary Schools and Secondary Modern Schools of that time as a compulsory subject. This, however, does not mean the end of opposition to P. T., which is proved by the concession enforced through the Education Amendment Bill of 1883. Progressive ideas, which include the demand for regular P. T. lessons, are promoted by the pioneers of socialism. Real headway in understanding the need for proper and regular physical education of the youth is made only after World War I. It culminates in demanding regular P. T. lessons for every child up to the age of eighteen. This demand, however is not met, because the ruling bourgeoisie is not really interested in the physical strength of the broad mass of the people. It is not until the 1930’s that the Czechoslovak system of education extricates itself from Austrian conservatism. As a result, there is also improvement in the general standard of P. T. at Czechoslovak schools. A new danger arises, however, in pedagogical reformism, by which school P. T. is also affected. In the late thirties, when the republic is endangered by German nazism, civil defence training becomes imperative and P. T. plays the foremost part in it. The Munich Agreement and the German occupation put an end to any further development of P. T. at schools. After the liberation of Czechoslovakia in 1945 the aims, tasks, content as well as the organisation of P. T. have changed in connection with the transformation of the bourgeois school into a socialist school. The development of P. T. in the socialist Czechoslovakia has culminated in the demand that it should be made possible for all young people to take part in organised and purposeful P. T. at least one hour a day. This demand is included in the resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia of November 17th, 1961, and is now being put into practice.