Is Treating Motor Problems in DCD Just a Matter of Practice and More Practice?
Developmental coordination disorder (DCD) is often called a motor learning deficit. The question addressed in this paper is whether improvement of motor skills is just a matter of mere practice. Without any kind of intervention, children with DCD do not improve their motor skills generally, whereas they do improve after task-oriented intervention. Merely offering children the opportunity to practice motor skills, for instance by playing active video games, did lead to improved motor performance according to recent research findings, but to a lesser extent than task-oriented intervention. We argue that children with DCD lack the required motor problem-solving skills necessary to further improve their performance. Explicit motor teaching with an emphasis on developing these problem-solving skills is a necessary ingredient of intervention in DCD, leveraging the effectiveness of intervention above that of mere practicing.
Centre for Human Movement Sciences, University of Groningen, University Medical Centre Groningen, PO Box 30.001, 9700 RB Groningen, The Netherlands.
Marina M
MM
Schoemaker
Faculty of Kinesiology and Rehabilitation Sciences, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium ; Department of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town, Old Main Building, Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town, South Africa.
Bouwien C M
BC
Smits-Engelsman
DCD; Developmental coordination disorder; Intervention; Motor learning deficit; Problem solving; Serious gaming