Influência do contexto de prática esportiva orientada no desenvolvimento motor global de crianças

Abstract

Guided motor activities, especially the involvement with sports skills has been considered important for the acquisition and refinement of basic motor skills. However, few studies have investigated the influence of the practice of sports with different specificities in gross motor development of children. Thus, the present study investigated the influence of the context of guided sports practice in the gross motor development of children. Then, two studies were conducted. The first study verified the influence of the weekly duration of the practice of guided motor activities in the gross motor development of children; and the second study aimed to analyze possible differences in gross motor development in accordance of kinds of guided sports activity. In order to assess the motor development was used the Test of Gross Motor Development (TGMD-2) and to analyze the socio-cultural context of the child's daily life, his/her parents answered an anamnesis. Forty-eight children from eight to nine years-old participated in the first study, practitioners and non-practitioners of guided sports activities. Thirty-nine children with age between seven and nine years-old participated of the second study, all practitioners of guided sports activities with distinct characteristics. The results of the first study showed higher gross motor development of children involved in guided sports practice, and therefore, they had higher weekly amount of practice in relation to children who participated only of the physical education classes. However, results should be viewed with caution, because findings did not show differences between children that practiced two guided motor activities and three guided motor activities. In addition, it is clear that children engaged in sports activities used to frequent places with sports installations in their free time, and consequently had less weekly hours of use of TV / DVD and computer / video games compared with children that had only physical education classes and used to stay at home in free time hours. Moreover, the results of the second study showed that the sport characteristics may influence in motor development of children. In other words, children who practiced sports that involve control objects presented higher motor development in this category of skills when compared to children who practice sports that did not have such skills. In sum, the context of guided sports practice influences in the gross motor development of children as an additional practice to physical education classes. However, the different kinds of sports activities seem to influence differently in the gross motor development of children.