Increasing motor skills and physical activitiy in children with Developmental Coordination Disorder

Summary

Rationale: Children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) experience difficulties in participation in daily life that require motor skills. Evidence suggests task-oriented motor interventions to be beneficial for improving motor skills in children with DCD. However, whether the newly learned motor skills lead to an increase in the amount of physical activities has not been investigated yet. Secondly, children with DCD are shown to have a lower perceived motor competence compared to typically developing children, which in turn, is a significant predictor of physical activity in children. Therefore, motor interventions that (also) aim to increase perceived motor competence might potentially be beneficial to improve both motor skills and physical activity in children with DCD. Studies investigating a possible additional benefit of focussing on a child’s perceived competence are currently lacking.

Objective: To investigate the short-term and long-term effects of a 12-week motor skills intervention, including behavioural motivation techniques, on physical activity, motor skills, perceived motor competence and global self-worth in children with DCD.

Study design: The study is a Clinical Controlled Trial (CCT). Assessors and paediatric therapists that administer care as usual to the control group will be blinded for treatment allocation. Assessment of both the intervention group and control group will take place at baseline (T0), after 12 treatment sessions (T1) and after 3 months of no intervention (T2).

Study population: In total, 48 children with DCD (age 7-10) will be recruited from three paediatric therapy practices in the Netherlands. Children referred to one of these paediatric therapy practices will function as the intervention group, while children referred to the other two paediatric therapy practices will function as the control group.

Intervention: Children in the intervention group will receive twelve individual-tailored treatment sessions of 30 minutes once a week. Treatment goals will be set for each child individually based upon structured assessment of the child’s motor skills and perceived motor competence. A variety of functional tasks and gross motor play activities will be given to enhance motor skills. During intervention sessions, behavioural motivation techniques will be used in order to enhance children’s perceived motor competence and physical activity. All participating therapists will receive special training before intervention.
Children in the control group will receive care as usual for twelve treatment sessions of 30 minutes once a week.

The hypothesis of this study is that an individual tailored task-oriented motor skills intervention with additional emphasis on behavioural motivation techniques will increase motor skills, physical activity, perceived motor competence and global self-worth in children with DCD.

Assessment of both the intervention group and control group will take place at baseline (T0), after 12 treatment sessions (T1) and after 3 months of no intervention (T2)

Intervention group:
Children in the intervention group will receive twelve individual-tailored treatment sessions of 30 minutes once a week. Treatment goals will be set for each child individually based upon structured assessment of the child’s motor skills and perceived motor competence. A variety of functional tasks and gross motor play activities will be given to enhance motor skills. During intervention sessions, behavioural motivation techniques will be used in order to enhance children’s perceived motor competence and physical activity. All participating therapists will receive special training before intervention.



Control group:

Children in the control group will receive care as usual for twelve treatment sessions of 30 minutes once a week.