Evaluation of Motor Skills for Special Children

Abstract

The study was aimed at assessing the basic motor skills of the children and young adult with a moderate level of mental retardation (MR). The current research also evaluated the variations between boys and girls as well as various age groups. The purpose of the research was to identify the seven loco motor skills that included walking, running, jumping, throwing, kicking, agility and balance of moderate MR children and the young adult with a different age group. The sample included n=90 students (45 boys and 45 girls) of moderate MR between the age of 9 and 15 years. The participants were in special schools of St. Annes Convent and St. Bishop Sargent School of the mentally retarded children, Tirunelveli. Respondents were split in three groups (9-11, 12-13 and 14-15 years old). The evaluation of the basic motor skills was done using Test of Gross Motor Development (TGMD, Ulrich, 1985). The TGMD studies on seven loco motor skills. The effect of the two categories of variables on the dependent variables was assessed using descriptive statistics and the two- way factorial (2x3) Analysis of variance (ANOVA). In the case that the obtained F ratio of interaction was significant; the simple effect test was applied to determine which of the mean performance score of gender and age groups were significant. The test used to compare interpretations was the scheffes test which was done in the individual comparisons. The findings showed that the age groups varied significantly in the performance of basic motor skills of the children and young adult boys and girls having moderate MR. It is therefore advisable that the adapted physical educators should focus on in a special designed adapted physical education program to the advancement of basic motor skills in the children with moderate mental retardation.