TITLE:
Reducing the Object Control Skills Gender Gap in Elementary School Boys and Girls
AUTHORS:
Dwayne P. Sheehan, Karin Lienhard, Diala Ammar
KEYWORDS:
Object Control, Fundamental Movement Skills, Gender, Intervention
JOURNAL NAME:
Advances in Physical Education,
Vol.10 No.2,
May
28,
2020
ABSTRACT: Purpose: This study was aimed to understand the effect of a customized physical education (PE) program on object control skills (OCS) in third grade schoolgirls, and to compare their skills to their male counterparts. Methods: Seventy-six children (32 girls, 44 boys) aged 8 - 9 years were assessed at baseline, after an all-girls six-week intervention program (post-test), and after six weeks of resuming co-educational regular PE (retention). Assessments included the upper limb coordination subtest from the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency, second edition (BOT-2), and the ball skills component of the Test of Gross Motor Development, version three (TGMD-3). Results: Findings from both assessment tools showed that boys had significantly better upper limb coordination and ball skills at baseline (P -0.1, 2.9) for upper limb coordination and +2.8 (P Conclusion: This research suggests that a six-week all-girls intervention program reduces the variance in OCS proficiency in pre-adolescent boys and girls.