Assessment of gross motor skills in primary schools children from the Czech Republic

Background: Motor skills are very important for socialization, academic achievement, self-concept and adaptation, etc. Physical education should focus on improving this area and increasing the level of motor skills. In the Czech Republic there exists the Framework Curriculum, which sets key competences which pupils should manage. Physical education outputs are not clearly given, so it is not clear which skills and movements should be covered during the first educational period. The aim of the research is to assess gross motor skills in detail in children attending primary schools from 5 regions in the Czech Republic. Material and methods: The research group was created by 224 (124 boys and 100 girls) children with an average age of 8.32 years (first educational period) from 15 primary schools. Results: The research results indicate that the level of gross motor skills is rather alarming (no children scored the Superior or Very Superior level). More than a half of the children scored a lower than average level, while only 41% scored an average or higher level of gross motor skills. Conclusions: It is important to set some standards to curriculum to know what children should manage within physical education at the end of each school year during compulsory school education.