Associations between academic and motor performance in a heterogeneous sample of children with learning disabilities

Pieter Jelle Vuijk, Esther Hartman, Remo Mombarg, Erik Scherder, Chris Visscher

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

A heterogeneous sample of 137 school-aged children with learning disabilities (IQ > 80) attending special needs schools was examined on the Movement Assessment Battery for Children (MABC). The results show that compared to the available norm scores, 52.6% of the children tested performed below the 15th percentile on manual dexterity, 40.9% on ball skills, and 33.7% on balance skills. Furthermore, after controlling for IQ, significant small to moderate partial correlations were found between spelling and mathematics and the MABC total score, as well as small to moderate correlations between mathematics and balance, between reading and ball skills, and between spelling and manual dexterity. The present findings are compared with previously reported results obtained in more homogenous groups, and based on the resultant relationships between academic performance and motor development, recommendations for future motor intervention studies are made.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)276-282
JournalJournal of Learning Disabilities
Volume44
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - May 2011

Keywords

  • children
  • learning disorders
  • mathematics
  • psychological tests
  • psychomotor performance
  • reading

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Associations between academic and motor performance in a heterogeneous sample of children with learning disabilities'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this