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What Esperanto word may be used to translate the English "PE"? I'm talking about the subject in school, Physical Education.

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I would recommend using "sporta edukado". When you want to say "PE lesson", you can just say "sporta leciono".

Additionally, the forms "korpa edukado" and "fizika edukado" are also used in practice. However, I recommend not to use "fizika edukado", as it can be misleading. The main meaning of the word root "fizik/" is 'physics', so "fizika edukado" could be misunderstood to mean 'education about physics'. The adjective "fizika" actually has, besides its regular meaning 'related to physics', also the irregular meaning 'related to matter or to the body', which explains why "fizika edukado" is not wrong. But this irregular meaning of "fizika" should only be used in contexts where it cannot be confused with the regular meaning of "fizika". Given that schools also have education about physics, the use of "fizika" in "fizika edukado" is problematically ambiguous. (I personally prefer to avoid "fizika" in its irregular meaning altogether, using "materia" or "korpa" instead.)

One disadvantage of both "korpa edukado" and "fizika edukado" compared to "sporta edukado" is that you cannot drop "edukado" from them when talking about a PE lesson. You would have to say "korp-edukada leciono" or "fizik-edukada leciono", which is really cumbersome compared to the simple "sporta leciono".

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  • I'm in doubt whether sporta is suitable. Sport is a part of what is practiced in physical education.
    – Marco
    Sep 13, 2016 at 13:56
  • In German we also call it "Sportunterricht" ("sport education"). I think it is quite a suitable expression. As far as I see it, practically all of what is done at PE can be classified as some sort of sport, at least with a vast interpretation of the word "sport". Or what is it in PE that you wouldn't classify as sport? Sep 14, 2016 at 8:27
  • I think it is not easy to distinguish PE from sport. I'm not sure. But these are some activities that I think that can be performed in PE and do not necessarily represent a sport: walking/hiking, dance, nutritional orientation and stretching. Some texts about it: Wikipedia, The difference between PE and sport, Sports vs PE.
    – Marco
    Sep 14, 2016 at 15:31
  • Concerning the website about differences between PE and sport: If you translated this to German, you would have to speak about the difference between "Sportunterricht" (sport education in schools) and "Sport" (sport more generally). Of course one can make such a distinction, just as one can make a distinction between mathematics education and mathematics (as a mathematician I know the difference is quite big). But given the way we speak about it in German, we probably feel less of a need for such a clarification of the differences than English speakers. Sep 16, 2016 at 7:59
  • At any rate, I don't see these minor differences as a reason not to say "sporta edukado" in Esperanto. By saying "sporta edukado" you are in no way implying that the activities are 100% identical to what you would call "sporto". If all of this doesn't convince you to use "sporta edukado", then just use "korpa edukado" instead. But please avoid "fizika edukado", as it is really misleading (as I explain in my answer). Sep 16, 2016 at 8:01
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That is simply fizika edukado.

The -ad- suggests that you are referring to a long course, and you can omit it.

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    The expression "fizika edukado" could be misunderstood to mean 'education about physics'. Therefore I would recommend to say "sporta edukado" instead. This also allows to use the simple "sporta leciono" instead of the cumbersome "fizik-edukada leciono" for a PE lesson. Sep 13, 2016 at 10:16

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