Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTEREST AND POPLARITY OF ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS Karmen Sibanc Faculty of Sport, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia Original research article Abstract In Slovenia gymnastics is covered on public and private television. Gymnastics in comparison to other sports is not very often shown on screens. The aim of our study is to find out, 'How future physical education teachers evaluate gymnastics according to their gender and sport knowledge.' We used 111 first grade students as a sample (76 males and 35 females). These students did not have any previous gymnastics experience. They had to complete a questionnaire where they evaluated gymnastics characteristics and also compared their interest for gymnastics with other individual and team sports popular in Slovenia. Results show that gymnastics especially on male student's opinion is not very popular, female students like it more. Most of the students prefer to watch other popular sports. Student's grades of gymnastics characteristics which are according to previous researches not what audience require. The expected conclusion is that gymnastics is one of less popular and lower rated sports in Slovenia. This is shown by the rating data from RTV Slovenia, even though Slovene gymnasts have always achieved good results and been very successful in international area. Keywords: audience, gymnastics, students, television. INTRODUCTION Medium is part of our everyday lives. The word "medium" of Latin origin means resource, mediator, and conductor. It is an important source of information and entertainment, and also a part of cultural and educational participation. We continue to use it as it's a necessity of our lives. One of the most important is definitely television. (Dodic & Nastav, 2011) We cannot imagine medium without sport contributions and shares. Local news pays more attention to sports rather than other topics. Cashmore (1996) says sport watched live on the field is for TV spectator insufficient. TV spectator wants sport presented as other kind of product that enable him comfort. Presence of TV on sport events seems inevitable. TV coverage in sport events changed the expectations, perception, patterns of viewing and rules in sport. That would be for example game length, shorter half-time brakes, night ski races (Oblak, 2007). There are many sports which are specific to certain Countries and Cultural Areas. These sports have become more known and popular throughout the world with assistance of television. Sport events have been moved from local areas and became available to mass audience all over Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 the world (Larsen, 2002). Sport that does not get presented on TV cannot count on support of bigger crowd. Sports such as bowling where Slovenians achieve top scores will never get the attention of the general public. We can claim that TV has big influence in popularity of certain branches in sport (Oblak 2007). In relation to the amount of time sport airs on Television it increases the amount of sports fans for the particular sports. Characteristics of sports include investment of time, money, feelings, knowledge of athletes, statistics, strategies, and emotional loyalty to some athletes or teams. These characteristic are used in conversations. (Wenner, 1998). Wenners position of this case can be illustrated in Europeans most rated soccer. For Instance the characteristics of soccer can include knowledge of rules in the game, feeling of membership to a certain team and good connoisseurship for players, their roles in the team and their placement on the field. Wenner (1998) also explains that these feeling and experiences contribute to making broadcasted sports immeasurably important and pleasant for admirers. Wenner (1998) describes findings of different authors. He uses their finding to create an overall conclusion of the difference between audience genders. Male and female had different way of socializing, learning about sport and coincidently their experiences are different. The ideals of sport usually are based upon manhood (aggression, courage, rivalry and strength). This is an enabler to get people involved in sport. Sports commentators' style of reporting tends to lean more towards the male audience. Their comments show aggression levels in sport which males enjoy more than females because of the larger percentage of males in the audience. Men insist in sport which is fast-paced and involved physical contact, while women tend to enjoy slow-paced and less brutal sports like baseball and tennis. Men usually enjoy action oriented and informative contents, while female like dramatic, musical and comic content. Sport is watched mostly in meeting situations (living rooms, bars, in groups). This way sport gets new meaning. Watching sport in groups and then talk about it all day long. For this identification scene has created pleasure in sport viewing. Wenner also mentions TV sport as »male-centered genre« which is based on traditional concept of manhood and womanhood and men prefer to watch sport topics more than women. Men have no problem watching their wives favorite sport with them while women rarely watch husband favorite sport with their husband. But there are also existing evidence of great numbers of women enjoying TV sport program (Wenner 1998). Gantz and Wenner (1991), in Wenner (1998) discovered that females watch sport for something to do with friends and family, while male act like sport fans and lovers. Comparing to women, there is a lot more men who watch sport for relaxation, relief and alcohol consumption. "Men probably watch sport repeatedly because they enjoy the tension and drama in sport competitions, and they get new topics for conversation". Sport broadcasts are a rich, yet often overlooked source of views and ideas about the human being and its place in society. Certainly, the fundamental purpose of sports contents is not to provide "serious" contents, but to entertain the audience. By professional leagues and athletes doing well in their sports they entertain the audience. The numbers of people they reach, or maybe even because of it, are remarkable and many sport contents achieve significantly greater viewership figures than other types of programming. Like all television content, sports broadcasts contribute to the cultivation of the viewer's perception of society (Licen, 2011). Viewing of gymnastics on television has recently reached average results regarding to ratings of other sports represented by public TV Slovenia. We assume that gymnastics is one of the attractive sports, but according to the mentioned facts it does not belong to the group of sport. Which means it is not given as much airtime. That is seen in Table 1. Gymnastics was in the year of 2010 Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 broadcasted 13 times, when for instance soccer games were broadcasted 382 times and got the most aired space. Soccer was followed by the winter olympics (220) and alpine skiing (101). In order following handball, basketball, formula 1, crosscountry skiing, tennis, ski jumping, volleyball, and athletics. Artistic gymnastics shares 17th place with ski flying. According to most spectators watching an sport event the highest score got soccer and Olympics, following by ski jumping and Alpine skiing, 5th is boxing despite only five broadcasted fights in whole year. Gymnastics was placed 26th out of 48 disciplines. Highest rating reached soccer which according to viewership occupies first three places with soccer world championship in South Africa where Slovenia played against USA, England and Algeria. Higher on scale are exchanging ski jumping, alpine skiing and soccer. High rating achieved the fight Zavec vs. Jackiewicz. Soon after those appears cross-country skiing (world cup in sprint and run on 9km track). Only just on 65th place comes basketball which scored high rating in our survey. Sportscasters offer what they think viewers want, and very little more. Naturally, the major sport broadcasts are relatively safe and efficient means of securing high rating figures and consequently high marketing incomes." A sportscaster's audience is very loyal and predictable, making it easier for network producers to seek new approaches in sports reporting (Licen, 2011). Gymnastics offers dozens of performances in a given night, particularly in team and individual event competitions, which give commentators lot to talk about (Angelini & Billings, 2010), consequently less time for "fun" is available. Comparing the number of broadcasts of gymnastics to soccer, we can in this context mention also the question of connoisseurship of sport itself and massive participation in certain sports. There are 41 gymnastics clubs in Slovenia, including clubs for rhythmic gymnastics (Members of GZS, 2012), and there are 317 soccer clubs in Slovenia (Clubs NZS, 2012). From this data we can see in Slovenia there is huge amount of people and children interested in playing soccer, which brings more audience and viewers, but in case of gymnastics that part is missing and there is less interested people and consecutively we can see there might be a connection with knowledge about connoisseurship of gymnastics in general. Thus gymnastics should be explained to people in their childhood and explaining the rules through the process of growing up, because they are often pretty complicated and tricky, but we have to know it for the understanding of gymnastics. Researches with questions for including children into gymnastics training have started quite some time ago. Binter (1978) in his bachelor's thesis made a conclusion that the most important indicators for elementary school youth to choose a sport are "the financial wellbeing of the family and the sociopolitical situation of their parents. Children are stimulated for gymnastics by parents or the teachers of physical education (P. E.) at school". School teachers many times create opinions of children and future grown up persons. Current attention of people is directed towards two actual questions, 'What is the quality of life?' and "How is it determined by individual profession route and their free time." That is why it matters what kind of habits and values an individual gets while growing up and how he/she learns to spend his/her free time. Systematic sport education process is during compulsory education familiarized to all children. Physical education has a special meaning, during involvement in sport every child must be comfortable. This depends on childs attitude towards sport and how the child will include sport in his/her free time later on (Kovač & Jurak, 2010). Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 Table 1. Individual viewed sports on RTV Slovenia in 2010 (RTV Slovenija Sport department, 2011)._ no. of viewers rating share sport N mean max min mean max min mean max min aerobic gymnastics 4 21277.3 30984.8 13540.1 1.1 1.6 0.7 4.75 6 3 alpine skiing 101 128659.7 326896.7 27080.2 6.651 16.9 1.4 34.873 64 4.1 artistic gymnastics 13 29758.4 52226.1 13540.1 1.538 2.7 0.7 8.308 17 3 athletics 23 35237.9 77372 9671.5 1.822 4 0.5 8.483 19 0 basketball 53 64415.8 220510.2 5802 3.33 11.4 0.3 12.634 40 1.5 beach volley 2 29014.5 30948.8 27080.2 1.5 1.6 1.4 7.25 7.7 6.8 best athlets 1 75437.7 75437.7 75437.7 3.9 3.9 3.9 11 11 11 biathlon 22 65150.7 150875.4 11605.8 3.368 7.8 0.6 19.773 39 7 boxing 5 144685.6 321093.8 42554.6 7.48 16.6 2.2 23.28 52.4 7 canoeing 2 21277.3 25145.9 17408.7 1.1 1.3 0.9 4 5 3 canoeing -flat water 2 6770.0 9671.5 3868.6 0.35 0.5 0.2 3 3 3 canoeing -slalom 8 25387.6 42554.6 13540.1 1.313 2.2 0.7 10.85 15 6 cross country 1 17408.7 17408.7 17408.7 0.9 0.9 0.9 3 3 3 cross country skiing 39 101476.4 307553.7 23211.6 5.246 15.9 1.2 23.485 57 8 cycling 20 36364.8 83174.9 5802.9 1.88 4.3 0.3 11.715 21 3 equestrian 1 79306.3 79306.3 79306.3 4.1 4.1 4.1 15 15 15 equestrian -dressage 1 36751.7 36751.7 36751.7 1.9 1.9 1.9 8 8 8 figure skating 14 38133.3 96715 17408.7 1.971 5 0.9 8.021 16 4 soccer 382 67467.5 518392.4 1934.3 3.488 26.8 0.1 15.071 82 1 formula 1 42 81562.9 185692.8 5802.9 4.217 9.6 0.3 24.995 47 9 Futsal 3 53515.6 75437.7 32883.1 2.767 3.9 1.7 7.5 12.5 3.5 handball 58 67800.5 205035.8 11605.8 3.505 10.6 0.6 11.848 28.5 1.5 ice hockey 6 93813.5 143138.2 44488.9 4.85 7.4 2.3 14.033 20 10.7 judo 7 23211.6 38686 13540.1 1.2 2 0.7 6.057 12 2.4 marathon 1 30948.8 30948.8 30948.8 1.6 1.6 1.6 4 4 4 Moto Grand Prix 18 81670.4 235984.6 25145.9 4.222 12.2 1.3 23.389 38 14 motocross 8 20551.9 44488.9 3868.6 1.062 2.3 0.2 4.875 9 2 mountain bike 2 30948.8 48357.5 13540.1 1.6 2.5 0.7 6 10 3 mountain running 2 29981.6 50291.0 9671.5 1.55 2.6 0.5 2 4 Olympic games 220 77758.8 408137.3 0 4.02 21.1 0 17.692 63 0 Paralympics games 7 32883.1 58029 11605.8 1.7 3 0.6 11.286 29 3 Rally 9 21922.0 46423.2 5802.9 1.133 2.4 0.3 5.556 10 3 Legend: N - number of covered events in individual sport event, mean - average value, max - maximum value, min - minimum value. Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 Media impact, structure of movement, and the way of how things work is easier to present for example soccer instead of gymnastics to a child. While understanding is better, the learning is easier and you can do it with less effort. Bučar (2003) states that: "In Slovenia a lot of elementary schools didn't realise the goals of physical education in part of gymnastics with rhythmical expression at all". Even though gymnastics is placed in the curriculum of physical education on all levels and forms of education and the selection of goals, contents and standards of knowledge is adjusted to the level of development of students (Novak, Kovač & Čuk, 2008). So apparently most of P.E teachers are perfunctory at teaching the basics of gymnastics, what shows in later attitude towards it. Also Tome has already in the year of 1983 researched Realization of physical education in schools. In SR Slovenia, in elementary and high schools. It was found that in elementary schools 8.8% and in high schools 30.3% did not even learn to roll over. In elementary schools 31,1% did not learn a handstand, in high school that percentage was 35,9. 38,2% of students in elementary school did not learn the cartwheel and 46,2% in high school (Jakše, 2007). So we can see the huge percentage of Slovenian population who do not know anything about the basics gymnastics and acrobatic skills. Teacher is the one who coordinates and adjusts learning goals, content and learning technologies to students and is directly responsible for learning process (Strmičnik, 2001). Every teacher's basic tasks are upbringing and education which cannot be separated in practice. The professional abilities and features depend on teacher education. School teachers need to be intellectual, bright and comprehensive. That is why he/she has to take the teaching knowledge and supplement the students with other sciences. Teacher's profession is performed by motivated and highly educated experts and has essential meaning in education of youth. Role of teaching is based on learning goals, content and chosen activities. According to inner lesson, from a teaching point of view organization is a very important teacher's choice of study forms and methods (Jakše, 2007). Jakše's conclusion was in elementary school the teachers think that being involved in gymnastics is important for moving and coordination. The elements of gymnastics continue increase in difficulty from beginning to the end of elementary school. The content of gymnastics has a positive effect on the development of moving abilities and has great influence on improving coordination skills, balance, flexibility and strength. It positively effects the psychophysical development of a child, because it teaches obedience, determination, diligence, precision, independence, involves confidence and influences on consistent body development. Despite all positive effects teachers has in last triad succeeded to infer less than 10 hours of gymnastics in whole school year (Jakše, 2007). The lack of realisation in the complex of performing gymnastics skills notices also in knowledge of P.E. students in the first year on faculty (Bučar, 2003). According to findings of Wenner (1998) artistic gymnastics does not have a lot of potential for success in male audience. Kane (1995, in Angelini & Billings, 2010) marks it as prototypically feminine sport. It is supposed to be more suitable for female audience because of its peacefulness. Binter (1978) also found out that mother education is an important factor for including children into gymnastics. But we have to make sure to include even more children into gymnastics for development of their motion skills which are needed for implementation in other sports. P.E teachers mostly take care of that. Therefore are the students of faculty of sport who are to become P.E. teachers are supposed to have extremely positive opinion about gymnastics so they will be able to provide the knowledge to younger generations. In this article the view of faculty of sport's students about gymnastics and how popular gymnastics is on their opinion is researched. Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 METHODS In the research all students who visited the first year of faculty of sport in 2011/2012 have been included. They are attending the class of artistic gymnastics 1. There were total of 111 interviewed students (35 females and 76 males, whose average age is 19,48 years) who were present on the teaching process. Students were ensured that the intention of the survey was for the purpose of scientific research and their identity will not be revealed. The interviewing took place in the first hour of the teaching process in October 2011. The students were not familiar with gymnastics and hadn't yet had any classes at the faculty of sport. All students gave written consent for interview. Variables sample represents a survey questionnaire that includes questions which are everyone's three most and less viewed sports and knowing of the rules for those sports. Students evaluated on their own opinion of which sports they prefer watching on TV and defines themselves for knowing the rules for chosen sports. They could choose any sport they could think of and their knowledge of rules answered with "yes" or "no". In the second part of questionnaire they estimated on their opinion which sport from the table they prefer watching on TV comparing to gymnastics. On one side of the table there was gymnastics and on the other side there were athletics, swimming, nine pin bowling, bowling green (boules), soccer, basketball, handball, volleyball, alpine skiing, ski jumping, biathlon and crosscountry skiing. In the third part they graded gymnastics characteristics with grades form 1-5 (1-the least, 3-medium, 5-the most). Available characteristics for gymnastics were: gymnastics is beautiful, difficult, attractive, violent, aggressive, artistic, boring, nationalistic, calm, chauvinistic, cheerful, traditional, gymnasts are crazy, following the same scale grades for male and female gymnastics and for individual events. In this part students evaluated gymnastics characteristics based on their own opinion based on their own experiences. Survey questionnaire is not standardised; it is formed on the basis of already made research and analysis by Wenner (1998) with the purpose of verifying points of view. Data collected by surveys were processed with SPSS program (Statistical Package for the Social Science), frequency and chi square test were performed. Frequencies and Chi Square were calculated, level of significant Chi square was set to 0.05 RESULTS Students were comparing artistic gymnastics with athletics, swimming, bowling, bowling green (boules), soccer, basketball, handball, volleyball, skiing, ski jumping, biathlon and cross-country skiing. Answers are shown in table 2. Results show that gymnastics is rather viewed than bowling, Bowling Green (boules), biathlon and cross-country skiing. In other cases they rather watch other sports except in case of swimming the score is tied. The biggest difference occurs by watching basketball games, followed by soccer games. If we separate the data by gender we get a rather different image. Female rather watch gymnastics than swimming, bowling, Bowling Green (boules), handball, biathlon and cross-country skiing. In case of athletics and ski jumping they can't decide. Statistically typical difference between male and female occurs in case of soccer (sig. 0,001), basketball (sig. 0,001), handball (sig. 0,001), ski jumping (sig. 0,012), biathlon (sig. 0,019) and cross-country skiing (sig. 0,020); while female rather watch gymnastics than any of these sports. The smallest difference is in case of bowling where 86% of male and 94% of female would rather watch gymnastics. More than half of students chose soccer, followed by basketball and athletics for their favorite three sports. More popular are also tennis, skiing, handball, gymnastics and volleyball. Middle observed sports are ice skating, swimming, martial arts, Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 American football and ski jumping. Rarely chosen are mostly extreme sports, Motor Grand prix and Formula 1, dancing, cycling, horseback riding, climbing or rock climbing, ice hockey, kayaking, water diving, triathlon. The rules for chosen sports are usually well known but there can still be found a difference between male and female students. While most male students mostly choose to watch soccer, basketball, athletics, tennis and handball, female students rather choose gymnastics, basketball and athletics over other sports. Well observed are also soccer, volleyball and skiing. We notice the difference in knowing the rules. Male students mostly know the rules for all the sports they choose while female students have poor knowledge or do not know the rules for the second or the third sport chosen. Table 2. Comparison of TV watching of gymnastics against other sports according to gender. N Sport more same less sport X2 (Pearson) sig. x2 M=74 16% 35% 49% Athletics 4.270a 0.118 F=34 Gymnastics 32% 35% 32% M=74 26% 42% 32% Swimming 2.710a 0.258 F=34 Gymnastics ■ 41% 35% 24% M=74 Gymnastics 86% 11% 3% Bowling 1.683a 0.431 F=34 94% 6% 0% M=74 Gymnastics 86% 14% 0% ■ Bowling green 2.847a 0.092 F=34 97% 3% 0% M=74 16% 7% 77% Soccer 14.387a 0.001 F=34 Gymnastics 32% 26% 41% M=74 9% 11% 80% Basketball 14.182a 0.001 F=34 Gymnastics 32% 24% 44% M=74 16% 15% 69% Handball 14.418a 0.001 F=34 Gymnastics 50% 15% 35% M=74 16% 28% 55% ■ Volleyball 2.132a 0.344 F=34 Gymnastics 18% 41% 41% M=74 Gymnastics 12% 18% 70% Alpine skiing 6.773a 0.034 F=34 24% 32% 44% M=74 Gymnastics 14% 27% 59% Ski jumping 8.784a 0.012 F=34 38% 24% 38% M=74 31% 31% 38% biathlon 7.954a 0.019 F=34 Gymnastics 50% 38% 12% M=74 31% 38% 31% Cross-country skiing 7.786 0.02 F=34 Gymnastics 56% 15% 29% Legend: F -number of female students; M - number of male students; N - number of participants; sig. Significance of parameter yl; yl (Pearson) - Pearsons correlation coefficient. Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 Table 3. Gymnastics characteristics grades according to gender. Properties N 1 2 3 4 5 x2 sig. x2 Beautiful M=75 2.7% 8.0% 30.7% 30.7% 28.0% 9.316a 0.054 F=35 0.0% 2.9% 11.4% 34.3% 51.4% Interesting M=75 2.7% 13.3% 40.0% 32.0% 12.0% 20.898a 0 F=35 0.0% 11.4% 11.4% 28.6% 48.6% Hard M=76 0.0% 0.0% 2.7% 13.3% 85.3% 0.488a 0.783 F=35 0.0% 0.0% 2.9% 8.6% 88.6% Attractive M=75 4.0% 6.7% 22.7% 24.0% 42.7% 4.049a 0.399 F=34 0.0% 2.9% 32.4% 32.4% 32.4% Violent M=76 81.3% 14.7% 4.0% 1.3% 0.0% 4.455a 0.348 F=35 85.7% 5.7% 5.7% 0.0% 2.9% Aggressive M=76 68.0% 24.0% 6.7% 1.3% 1.3% 3.404a 0.493 F=35 74.3% 14.3% 5.7% 0.0% 5.7% Artistic M=76 0.0% 5.3% 22.7% 45.3% 28.0% 3.715a 0.294 F=35 0.0% 2.9% 25.7% 28.6% 42.9% Boring M=76 20.0% 36.0% 37.3% 5.3% 2.7% 8.233a 0.083 F=35 42.9% 25.7% 22.9% 8.6% 0.0% Nationalistic M=76 56.0% 22.7% 16.0% 5.3% 1.3% 1.322a 0.858 F=35 60.0% 17.1% 14.3% 8.6% 0.0% Calm M=75 6.7% 22.7% 44.0% 20.0% 6.7% 4.326 0.364 F=35 17.1% 22.9% 31.4% 17.1% 11.4% Chauvinistic M=75 45.3% 24.0% 20.0% 8.0% 2.7% 2.519a 0.641 F=35 37.1% 17.1% 31.4% 11.4% 2.9% Cheerful M=76 24.0% 36.0% 33.3% 6.7% 1.3% 7.378a 0.117 F=35 8.6% 37.1% 34.3% 20.0% 0.0% Traditional M=75 5.3% 17.3% 42.7% 20.0% 14.7% 13.043a 0.011 F=35 20.0% 28.6% 28.6% 22.9% 0.0% Can identify with M=76 17.3% 49.3% 33.3% 1.3% 0.0% 22.440a 0 gymnasts F=35 42.9% 20.0% 20.0% 11.4% 5.7% Gymnasts are M=76 22.7% 14.7% 28.0% 22.7% 13.3% 5.179a 0.269 madman F=34 35.3% 20.6% 26.5% 14.7% 2.9% Mgym_whole M=53 0.0% 2.7% 30.7% 30.7% 6.7% 5.350a 0.148 F=24 0.0% 0.0% 25.0% 50.0% 25.0% Mgym_Floor M=76 6.7% 16.0% 37.3% 25.3% 14.7% 4.776a 0.444 F=35 2.9% 20.0% 25.7% 22.9% 28.6% Mgym Pommel M=76 5.3% 29.3% 52.0% 12.0% 2.7% 11.506 0.021 horse F=35 5.7% 11.4% 42.9% 25.7% 14.3% Mgym_Still rings M=75 4.0% 8.0% 22.7% 49.3% 16.0% 3.153a 0.533 F=35 8.6% 8.6% 14.3% 42.9% 25.7% Mgym_Vault M=76 2.7% 12.0% 30.7% 34.7% 21.3% 2.175 0.704 F=35 0.0% 11.4% 34.3% 25.7% 28.6% Mgym_Parallel bars M=76 4.0% 13.3% 22.7% 37.3% 24.0% 9.486a 0.05 F=35 2.9% 0.0% 25.7% 25.7% 45.7% Mgym_High bar M=75 4.0% 4.0% 26.7% 29.3% 36.0% 0.420a 0.981 F=35 5.7% 2.9% 22.9% 31.4% 37.1% Fgym_whole M=52 1.3% 8.0% 33.3% 21.3% 5.3% 20.239a 0 F=24 0.0% 8.3% 12.5% 29.2% 50.0% Fgym_Vault M=76 6.7% 21.3% 44.0% 25.3% 4.0% 6.924 0.14 F=35 5.7% 5.7% 40.0% 37.1% 11.4% Fgym_Uneven bars M=76 4.0% 18.7% 37.3% 29.3% 12.0% 17.595a 0.001 F=35 8.6% 2.9% 14.3% 37.1% 37.1% Fgym_Balance beam M=76 6.7% 30.7% 36.0% 22.7% 5.3% 33.697 0 F=35 5.7% 8.6% 11.4% 25.7% 48.6% Fgym_Floor M=76 0.0% 25.3% 18.7% 34.7% 22.7% 14.487 0.006 F=35 5.7% 5.7% 20.0% 22.9% 45.7% Legend: F - Number of female students; M - Number of male students; Mgym_ - Male gymnastics; N - Number of participants; sig. - Parameter significance x2; Fgym_ - Female gymnastics; x2 (Pearson) - Pearsons correlation coefficient. Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 Between unwanted sports is golf that reaches the highest percent, followed by soccer and ice skating. Relatively high percentage is also reached by swimming, tennis and formula 1. Several times were marked also handball, cycling, American football, marathon, chess, dancing and sometimes chosen gymnastics too. According to the survey for most unpopular sport students don't even know the rules. If the score is divided by gender the top unpopular sport remains golf. For male students the second place is shared by soccer and ice skating and for female students soccer shares first place with golf, followed by ice skating. High percentage for both genders is reached by formula 1, crosscountry skiing and tennis. For female students basketball also reached a pretty high percent. At characteristics score for gymnastics (Table 3) students most agree for gymnastics to be beautiful, medium interesting, pretty hard and attractive. Mostly it is considered to be non-violent, unaggressive, rather artistic and relatively boring. Gymnastics is not nationalistic and cheering. About tranquility and traditionalism the answers were normally divided. Students cannot identify themselves with gymnasts and only one third of students think that gymnasts are not crazy. In general they do not like the characteristics of gymnastics events. Although only a few answered that they don't like any of the events in gymnastics but they are mostly tending to the middle answer. In male gymnastics the least popular is pommel horse and the most popular are parallel bars and high bar. Female gymnastics is in average more poorly graded than male gymnastics but a little better result is achieved by the floor. Separated by gender are seen differences by the beauty (sig. 0,054), attractions (sig. 0,000), traditionalism (sig. 0,011), able to identify with gymnasts (sig. 0,000), different opinion about pommel horse (sig. 0,021), male parallel bars (sig. 0,050), female gymnastics in general (sig. 0,000), and the rest of female gymnastics events except vault. Female students have more positive opinion than male students about beauty and points of Interest in gymnastics. They marked it as less traditional and that it is harder to identify themselves as gymnasts than male students do. Pommel horse and parallel bars were also better graded by female students than male and the grades about female gymnastics practical aren't comparable. Male students graded female gymnastics pretty low, especially uneven bars and balance beam while female students assessed balance beam and floor very positively. The least difference in grading is in male high bar (sig. 0,981) which everyone like. Male vault also got good grade from both gender (sig. 0,704). Almost everybody agree on gymnastics being a very difficult sport (sig. 0,783). Male students agree in 85, 3% and female students in 88, 6%. DISCUSION Contribution of gymnastics to harmonized movement of whole body and its individual parts is priceless. Variety of motions that is consistent with gymnastics and the control of your own body in movement contribute to wide effect of gymnastics on evolvement of our physical ability (Novak idr. 2008). It's about the basics that should be learned by every child. Within familiarization of gymnastics as well as learning various motions and control of our own body, the rules of gymnastics should also be included. As the results of the questionnaire show, that student's knowledge of rules for sports they like to watch on TV in good. We cannot say the same for the knowledge on sports they do not prefer watching. Gymnastics does not stand out as a sport that popular to watch, but it is also not an unpopular one. Therefore we can't say that the students do or don't know the rules of gymnastics. If we use only male student results, where Wenner (2008) also states that TV sport is centered to male population, from our questionnaire we can see that males indicate gymnastics as middle interesting, pretty Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 attractive, totally unaggressive and pretty boring. In the same work Wenner notes that men watch sports because sport ideals are connected with masculinity - aggression, courage, rivalry and strength. Therefore gymnastics because of its natural characteristics cannot be one of most viewed sports on TV. According to the Table 1 we can see that results from the survey differ from general rating in Slovenia. In Slovenia skiing and ski jumping were always very popular sports, as also shown in data from RTV Slovenia. We can link that up with success of Slovene athletes in those sports. Names like Boris Strel, Bojan Križaj and Mateja Svet have marked Slovene and worlds skiing, and currently one of world's most successful skiers is Tina Maze. Gymnastics was marked by Leon Štukelj and Miro Cerar with great achievements and there were Mitja Petkovšek and Aljaž Pegan on the top of world's gymnastics. Now other Slovene gymnasts are reaching for the top. But still we figure out that achievements of the nation can help to rise up the ratings, but cannot stand out of its range. We can compare the number of matches broadcasted according to mentioned comparison between skiing and gymnastics. There were 101 skiing races in 2010 and only 13 gymnastics competitions. With that attitude gymnastics cannot compete with more popular and established sports. For that, in the background there are probably many reasons. We assume that one of the most important is connected with general opinion of boringness of this sport, for which lack of knowledge about the rules in gymnastics could be the reason. Rules in gymnastics are quite complicated and most viewers do not even try to understand them. Everyone understands that who gets higher score wins. In comparison to soccer or handball the philosophy in background seems quite simple. In soccer you run after the ball, dribble opposing defenders, find the closest and easiest route to the goal and score. In this part of game the tension increases, viewers are excited and expecting either goal or goalkeepers defense. In the case of success for the favorite team even more. But in the world of gymnastics that part is missing. Gymnastics is interesting if you live with it, you know the rules, you know the difficulty of single elements and at least the approximate score of gymnast's routine. The audience does not understand how the results of a gymnasts performance can end up quite similar when they do different level of difficulty for there routines. One gymnast may accolmplish astonishing routine by performing a simple routine well. Another may perform one which has more difficult skill level but then making some faults. That example shows us the importance of TV commentator who tries to explain the rules of gymnastics to viewers and introduces gymnastics as interesting, fun and attractive sport. In Beijing Olympics there were the biggest part of subjective comments in gymnastics and least in soccer. Journalists and media commentators claim, that objectiveness is the essential thing to guide their work. But some part of subjective comments is included, well accepted and unavoidable (Licen, 2011). Consideration about reorganizing gymnastics competition might be required. According to Wenner's analyzes audience like attractive show, increasing tension, cheering on social meetings and possibility of relaxation during watching the competition. Regarding to this, when organizing a gymnastics competition, organizers should concentrate to female audience population. In this sport there is no aggressiveness and brutality, unnecessary strength demonstration and competitiveness. When watching gymnastics elements be performed it's not what meets the eyes of the television veiwers. A lot of strength is needed to accomplish these. The rules of gymnastics tend to light, gentle and soft movement. A lot of extremely attractive elements look very easy to accomplish because of these. According to the statements above most of Slovene population who do not have experience with practicing gymnastics and do not have Science of Gymnastics Journal 49 Science of Gymnastics Journal Sibanc K. HOW P.E. STUDENTS EVALUATE THEIR INTERESR AND POPULARITY. Vol. 5 Issue 1: 49 - 60 notion about the difficulty involved means cannot valuate the sport as accurately. Gymnastics association of Slovenia (GZS) started to realize the problem for lack of knowledge about gymnastics in general population. The project »Gymnastics in elementary school« is the result of many years of tendencies to popularise gymnastics to children and increase the numbers of children that would like to practice gymnastics. Gymnastics lost its mass recognition; less and less children are practicing recreational gymnastics in organized groups. Results of Fiser research (2008) indicated that the most important motive of why parents include children into the program is because "Sport benefits to the help of my child" with head motives "The child wants to visit the exercise" and "with gymnastics improves his/her personal abilities". Statistically there is no difference between genders in including children into gymnastics. We found out that parents are aware of positive influences and usefulness of gymnastics content on children development (Fiser, 2008). According to the opinion of the relatively small amount of female students, there is a future for gymnastics in Slovenia. As it seems for the male to become more interested in watching gymnastics there needs to be initiated some innovations into broadcasts of gymnastics competitions from the attractiveness and rising the tension point of view in gymnastics halls. Future research should be focused on wishes of gymnastics audience, to improve attractiveness, to make more people watch gymnastics and enjoy it. As shown in Licen's (2011) research and Billings, Angelini & Wu (2011) analysis, audience like nationalistic comments when watching sports. Billions of viewers from all nations watch Olympic games with a sense, that they are watching countries compete for dominance (Billings, Angelini & Wu 2011). 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