The purpose of this research was to investigate the transition of the dance curriculum which resulted from the transformation of the guidelines for sports fields’ curriculum in physical education in junior high school from optional to compulsory and coeducational. The subjects were physical education teachers from public junior high schools in Tokyo. The data were collected from fiscal 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2012.
From the research, it was cleared that the planning rate of the compulsory dance classes for the male students in grade 1 or 2 has been increasing from 10% in fiscal 2007 to 60% in fiscal 2012. However, this increase was still less than that of the female students which was 80%, these rates were not adequate to meet the compulsory requirements. The male-only classes and the mixed classes were created to accommodate the male students. However the time provided for these classes was shorter than that of the female-only classes. And the number of male dance teachers with inadequate teaching experience in dance has been increasing in proportion to the increase of these classes. In most cases, they’re in charge of the male-only classes or the mixed classes. Modern rhythm dance was the most popular choice across all classes, but these classes seemed more confusing to teach. On the other hand, creative dance was rarely chosen, except for the female-only classes which were taught by female teachers with adequate experiences. Furthermore, only some of the teachers have attended seminars for teaching dance, so the quality of these dance classes might also be on the decline.

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