Effects of Strategy Use on Children's Motor Performance in a Continuous Timing Task

Abstract

The purposes of this study were to associate age-related performance deficits in children with the use of recall strategies and to determine whether children who performed poorly in cycling would benefit from learning a recall strategy. In Experiment 1, 18 younger children (ages 5-7 years) and 18 older children (ages 8-10 years) were asked to recall selected pedaling cadences. The majority of the older children used strategies and performed with less error than the younger children. In Experiment 2, children with a high number of errors in Experiment 1 were assigned to an experimental or a control group. The children in the experimental group were taught to use a specific recall strategy. The results showed that children who received the instruction in strategy use improved their performance.

Key words:

• Memory
• Motor development
• Pedaling
• Recall

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ting Liu

We thank two anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions on the manuscript draft. Please address correspondence concerning this article to Ting Liu, Department of Health and Human Performance, College of Education, Texas State University-San Marcos, 601 University Drive, San Marcos, TX 78666.