2026 SHAPE Iowa

Join the Iowa Department of Natural Resources for an exciting pre-convention outdoor learning experience at Lake Macbride State Park! Participants will rotate through hands-on activities including fishing, kayaking, atlatl throwing, archery, and outdoor cooking while exploring engaging ways to bring outdoor recreation and environmental education into their own schools and programs. Attendees will leave with practical skills, valuable resources, and ready-to-use ideas to help create meaningful outdoor experiences for students and communities.

Every teaching decision is shaped by a frame—whether we are aware of it or not. This session invites participants to examine how implicit and explicit frames influence planning, instruction, and assessment in physical education. Using Meaningful Physical Education (MPE) as a lens, participants will consider how an intentional frame can bring coherence and clarity to everyday decision-making.
Participants will:
• Reflect on and articulate the frames that currently guide their teaching decisions
•Analyze how frames influence curriculum, instruction, and assessment
•Explore Meaningful Physical Education as a unifying frame for practice
•Apply intentional framing to support more coherent decision-making

Energize your PE classes with active, cross-curricular learning! In this interactive session, you’ll explore popular tools and resources to blend academics with movement. These activities and strategies support math, reading, spelling, nutrition education, and more while building motor skills, teamwork, and cognitive growth. Ideal for K–12 students. You’ll leave with fun, practical ideas ready to use.

Use the USTA's facility grant program to resurface or build new tennis courts for your school district.  Grants range from $60,000 to $150,000 depending on qualified tennis projects.  This session will explain the grant requirements and grant process.

Ultimate PaddleZlam is an innovate physical education activity that elevates traditional pickleball into a dynamic, team-based learning experience designed to promote physical literacy, skill development, strategic thinkinkin, and lifelong engagement in physical activity.

What happens when we move together—intentionally, rhythmically, and with others in mind? This session explores synchronized movement as a pathway to co-regulation, connection, and community in physical education. Grounded in polyvagal theory and research on rhythm and relational learning, participants will engage in shared movement experiences that highlight how rhythm and coordination can support emotional safety and social connection. Participants will experience how moving in synchrony can shift individual and group regulation in real time. Through movement, reflection, and discussion, we will examine how these experiences can shape classroom environments in which regulation is collectively supported, and students feel a deeper sense of belonging.
Participants will:
• Experience and analyze how synchronized, rhythmic movement supports co-regulation, connection, and community-building
• Interpret and apply key concepts from polyvagal theory using accessible language to inform practice and support advocacy for physical education
• Design or adapt movement experiences that foster emotional safety, belonging, and shared regulation

What does it mean for students to truly become movers? This session explores the intersection of SHAPE America Standard 1 (motor competence), contemporary motor learning research, and the Meaningful Physical Education (MPE) framework. Participants will engage in movement experiences that highlight principles such as representative design, constraint manipulation, and repetition without repetition, while examining how these ideas can deepen students’ sense of competence, agency, and meaningful engagement. Rather than viewing skill development as the replication of a single “ideal” form, this session invites educators to consider how learning emerges through exploration, adaptation, and purposeful design.Participants will:

• Reframe motor competence (SHAPE Standard 1) as adaptive, functional, and context-dependent rather than fixed or form-based
• Explore and apply key motor learning principles (e.g., representative design, constraint manipulation, repetition without repetition, form follows function) through embodied experiences
• Design learning tasks that support autonomy, exploration, and variability while promoting meaningful participation

Artificial Intelligence: Can be polarizing in and out of Physical Education. You're invited to see how Will uses AI to save his own educational time and improve his practice based on what his student's share.

Explore how physical education can extend learning beyond the gym by reinforcing academic concepts through movement-based experiences. This session provides engaging, ready-to-use activities that integrate content areas such as literacy, math, and health while maintaining high levels of physical activity. Participants will actively engage in a variety of adaptable activities that promote critical thinking, collaboration, and application while leaving with practical ideas that can be immediately implemented to support student learning across multiple content areas.