Analysis of gain scores, also called change scores or difference scores, was used to test for the effect of treatment; unpaired Student’s t-tests were used to compare the post- and pre-test difference in scores between the control and intervention groups (Allison, 1990; Ragosa, 1995; Oakes and Feldman, 2001). Since baseline differences between groups existed at pre-test, analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was applied as an alternative to analyze the scores. We used the post-test gross motor and pre-literacy scores as the dependent variable, the control/intervention group as independent variable and the pre-test score as covariate. ANCOVA focuses on differences between the groups at post-test while holding constant pre-test differences. In all the analyses, the level of significance was set at p < 0.05. Statistics were performed by using STATA/MP 12.1.
Results
In the baseline, CG and IG did not tell you people high differences (p > 0.05) when it comes to gender, chronological ages, pounds, top, Bmi and terrible engine character, since the shown in the Desk 2.
After the experimental period, CG did not exhibit any significant difference in locomotor, object-control skills or QGMD scores. In contrast, the intervention group showed significant differences (p < 0.001) from baseline to post-test in gross motor skills. As shown in Figures 2, 3, locomotor, object-control skills and QGMD increased by 24.4%, 9.7%, and 10.4%, respectively, in IG. Moreover, the mean difference of QGMD between pre- and post-intervention in IG was significantly higher than that in CG (11.3 vs. 3.2, p = 0.0082). These results confirmed preliminary results previously reported (Battaglia et al., 2018). The same result occurred for the locomotor skills, showing a significant mean difference of 2.5 in IG compared to the 0.7 in CG (p = 0.0050). The analysis of covariance confirmed the positive effect of the intervention in the improvement of children's gross motor skills, starting even from different pre-test scores.
Figure 2. Score of gross motor development quotient in control and intervention group. ??? p < 0.01, compared with pre-test.
Figure 3. Score of locomotor and object control skills after 16 weeks of physical education program. ??? p < 0.01, compared with pre-test.
Table 3 displays that pieces of locomotor and you may object handle enjoy didn’t upsurge in the manage class following the experimental several months, whenever you are an incredibly extreme boost is actually noticed in every item from inside the IG responding in order to PEP.
All pre-literacy skills notably improved for the IG pursuing the input several months, during CG only the number of problems with the naming out of items rather diminished (look for Desk 4). not, the brand new analyses away from acquire scores and you can ANCOVA failed to reveal people high impression regarding the intervention ranging from mamba ekÅŸi CG and IG.
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This study investigated the effects of a specific PEP on the outcomes of fundamental motor and pre-literacy skills concerning visual analysis and spatial orientation abilities in a sample of preschool children from Palermo. Gross motor development was expressed as a composite score of a set of fundamental motor skills across the two gross motor skill domains. We observed a positive effect of PEP on gross motor development in the studied population. In particular, IG showed a significant increase in both locomotor (p < 0. These findings are consistent with those of previous studies that investigated the effect of PE on preschoolers' gross motor skills (Derri et al. For instance, Derri et al. Analysis of the covariance and gain scores confirmed the positive effect of our intervention in the rise of children's gross motor skills, even starting from different pre-test scores.
The usage obtain score or ANCOVA might have been mainly contended prior to now about data away from pre-test/post-take to habits. As the ANCOVA is acceptable only for randomized controlled samples and you may can also be prejudice contributes to low-similar communities otherwise observational models, the research from obtain ratings offers up compatible, objective tests for the majority look patterns (Ragosa, 1995). On the absence of randomization, whenever standard differences when considering organizations occur, change-get activities produce smaller biased quotes (Allison, 1990). Based on QGMD score recommended from the manual’s advice, we found that IG enhanced the newest gross engine abilities of average to above average in contrast to CG, and therefore don’t let you know one relevant transform. On the other hand, the firm of a single session a number of sandwich-stages (social-warm up, central, cool-down-opinions phase) is actually an appropriate cure for improve children’s contribution.