Effects of Developmental Gymnastics Exercise Program on Preschoolers' Motor Skills: A Randomised Controlled Trial.
Highlights: What are the main findings? The 36-week developmental gymnastics (DG) programme greatly helped preschoolers with their object control and locomotor skills. The effect sizes ranged from small to large. Age and gender influenced specific improvements: girls excelled in locomotor tasks, whe...
| Publicado en: | Children Vol. 12; no. 12; pp. 1590 - 1610 |
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| Autores principales: | , , , , , , |
| Formato: | research tables/charts randomized controlled trial Journal Article |
| Publicado: |
MDPI
Dec2025
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ccm&AN=190544851&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ccm uiTerm: 190544851 longDbName: CINAHL Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: dissinfo: jinfo: jid: 22279067 LW6K jtl: Children issn: 22279067 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Dec2025 vid: 12 iid: 12 pid: 97109 pub: MDPI artinfo: ui: 190544851 190544851 190544851 10.3390/children12121590 190544851 ppf: 1590 ppct: 20 formats: tig: atl: Effects of Developmental Gymnastics Exercise Program on Preschoolers' Motor Skills: A Randomised Controlled Trial. aug: au: Radanović, Danilo Marinković, Dragan Mačak, Draženka Milić, Zoran Popović, Boris Pantović, Milan Madić, Dejan M. affil: Faculty of Sport and Physical Education, University of Novi Sad, 21000 Novi Sad, Serbia sug: subj: Physical Education and Training In Infancy and Childhood Gymnastics Education Therapeutic Exercise In Infancy and Childhood Physical Activity In Infancy and Childhood Motor Skills Evaluation Program Evaluation Age Factors Sex Factors Body Mass Index Human Male Female Child, Preschool Child Serbia Randomized Controlled Trials Random Assignment Comparative Studies Anthropometry Descriptive Statistics Data Analysis Software T-Tests Analysis of Covariance Power Analysis Post Hoc Analysis Running Hopping Jumping Clinical Assessment Tools Child, Preschool: 2-5 years Child: 6-12 years Male Female ab: Highlights: What are the main findings? The 36-week developmental gymnastics (DG) programme greatly helped preschoolers with their object control and locomotor skills. The effect sizes ranged from small to large. Age and gender influenced specific improvements: girls excelled in locomotor tasks, whereas boys exhibited superior enhancements in object control performance. What is the implication of the main finding? Two structured DG sessions weekly are adequate to promote gross motor skill development in early childhood. Adding DG to preschool physical education can help children improve locomotor performance and stay active and healthy for a long time. Background/Objectives: The developmental gymnastics (DG) exercise programme is a specialised form of gymnastics that focuses on the physical, cognitive, and motor development of individuals, particularly children. This 36-week study aimed to investigate the effect of DG on the gross motor skills (GMS) of preschoolers. Methods: This randomised controlled trial included 300 preschool children (5.1 ± 0.83 years), of whom 220 completed the 36-week programme (EG = 99, CG = 121). The children were randomly assigned to either an experimental group or a control group following standard physical activities. Attrition was mainly due to illness or attendance below 80%. Analyses were adjusted for age and BMI to control for confounding variables. Children in the CG participated in three organised extracurricular physical activities per week. In contrast, those in the EG engaged in 60 min of the designated exercise programme twice a week. We employed the Test of Gross Motor Development-2 (TGMD-2) to evaluate gross motor skills (GMS). Results: The mixed ANCOVA models revealed that EG showed greater improvement in all locomotor skills tests compared with the CG, with mean differences in TGMD-2 total scores of +3.28 points (p = 0.0002, partial η2 = 0.24). Effect sizes ranged from small to large (partial η2 = 0.05–0.19; Cohen's d = 0.6–1.4), indicating meaningful practical improvements in gross motor competence. In the combined sample, both groups demonstrated similar improvements in all tests of object control skills. However, gender-specific differences were observed in the improvement of underhand roll, stationary dribble performance, and the total score of object control skills. Girls in the CG showed more improvement in underhand roll performance than girls in the EG. In contrast, boys in the EG demonstrated greater improvements in stationary dribble performance (4%) and the total score for object control skills (3%) compared to boys in the CG. Conclusions: The results of this study indicate that the nine-month DG programme was associated with significant improvements in GMS in preschool children. These findings highlight the value of structured gymnastics as a sustainable component of preschool curricula. Trial Registration Number: NCT06315036. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: research tables/charts randomized controlled trial Journal Article ougenre: Article language: English refInfo: holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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