THREE PHYSICAL EDUCATION PROGRAMS, SKILL-ORIENTED, PLAY- ORIENTED, AND FREE-PLAY ORIENTED WERE DEVELOPED. THESE PROGRAMS WERE EXAMINED, INITIALLY, BY SEVEN EXPERTS AND THEN SUBJECTED TO A PILOT STUDY. THE REVISED PROGRAMS WERE TAUGHT BY RESEARCH ASSISTANTS TO SIX EXPERIMENTAL GROUPS WHICH INCLUDED 82 BOYS AT TWO STATE SCHOOLS FOR THE MENTALLY RETARDED. THE INSTRUCTIONAL PERIOD WAS 39 CLASS HOURS (13 WEEKS) IN DURATION, EXCLUSIVE OF TIME TAKEN FOR PURPOSES OF EVALUATION. THE PROGRAMS WERE EVALUATED ON THE BASIS OF PRETESTS AND POST-TESTS WHICH ASCERTAINED ACHIEVEMENT LEVELS IN ITEMS RELATING TO PHYSICAL FITNESS, MOTOR ABILITY, AND SOCIAL ADJUSTMENT. MAJOR CONCLUSIONS WERE THAT (1) THE SKILL-ORIENTED GROUPS AT BOTH SCHOOLS INDICATED SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENT IN A GREATER NUMBER OF TEST ITEMS THAN DID THE OTHERS, (2) THESE SAME TWO GROUPS INDICATED A MORE UNIFORM IMPROVEMENT IN MOTOR ABILITY ITEMS, (3) THE SKILL-ORIENTED GROUP AT ONE SCHOOL INDICATED SIGNIFICANTLY BETTER PERFORMANCES THAN THE OTHER GROUPS AT THAT SCHOOL IN THE PULL-UPS AND VOLLEYBALL WALL VOLLEY, AND (4) BOTH THE SKILL-ORIENTED AND FREE-PLAY GROUPS AT THIS SCHOOL WERE SIGNIFICANTLY BETTER THAN THE PLAY-ORIENTED GROUP IN THE BASKETBALL WALL PASS. A MAJOR RECOMMENDATION WAS THAT A SKILL-ORIENTED PHYSICAL EDUCATION PROGRAM, SIMILAR TO THE ONE DEVELOPED IN THIS STUDY, BE UTILIZED FOR EDUCABLE MENTALLY RETARDED BOYS.