Abstract:
The purpose of the current study was to examine the impact of some selected
existing developmental games on the motor skill (balance, coordination and
agility) development of children aged between 10 to 12 years, in the Cape Coast
Metropolis in the Central Region of Ghana. Quasi-experimental design was
employed in the study. Thirty school children were randomly sampled for the
study. The children included five boys and five girls from each of the age groups
of 10, 11, and 12. This sample was selected to meet the demands for the test
battery (i.e.Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency-2 (BOT-2)
(Bruininks & Bruininks, 2005), which takes 15-20 minutes to test each
participant). The group participated in a 12-week motor skills development
programme designed for this study. The pupils’ levels of balance, coordination
and agility were assessed with BOT-2 battery test using a single group pretestformulated
and tested, hypotheses one,
two and three were tested using repeated measure ANOVA, while hypothesis 4
was tested with a repeated factorial ANOVA. The main findings showed that the
developmental games were effective tools that could be utilized in improving
balance, agility and coordination among the children aged between 10-12 years,
especially if the children are given about three months interval to practice. Thus,
using these available developmental games can reduce the effects limited
resources have on the teaching and learning of Physical Education (PE) and the
general development and elevation of sports in the country. PE teachers are
encouraged to use these developmental games to help children to improve their
motor skills, in the resource constraint environment.
