Twelve Month Follow-up of Motor Skill Intervention on Fundamental Motor Skills in the Pre-schools

Background: The present study aims to determine whether motor skill intervention children sustained fundamental motor skill proficiency after one year of follow-up. 

Methods: The study was carried out among 39 girls (5.31± 0.23 yrs.) and boys (5.23±0.2 yrs.) preschoolers without any previously-identified health problems. Participations were randomized to motor skill intervention with physical education specialists (n=19) and control group that performed ordinary preschool physical activity (n=20). The TGMD-2 was used to measure children's FMS. The intervention was implemented 2 days a week for 12 months. Data were collected and analyzed in 12 months’ follow-up to examine the long-term effect of motor skill intervention on FMS. 

Results: Using repeated measure MANCOVA with gender covariate showed that participation in motor skill intervention were more improvement in locomotor and object control skills during both post-test and follow-up. In the control group, children developed locomotor skills, but object control in this group did not improve significantly (p>0.01). 

Conclusions: The results of this study illustrate that FMS not only requires natural growth and maturity for its development but also requires constant interaction with the stimuli coming from the educational program and especially environmental object control skills equipment in preschools.