The identification and assessment of young children with movement difficulties

Abstract

The focus of this research study is the identification and assessment of children aged 3 to 5 years with movement difficulties. It is concerned with the construction of the Early Years Movement Skills Checklist, which is an assessment instrument designed to be used flexibly by teachers and parents to identify and assess young children with movement difficulties. The Checklist is in five sections: four sections contain activities which are functional in nature relating to the child’s everyday life. The thinking behind this involves a belief supported by the relevant literature that both assessment and intervention should be as close as possible to the child’s daily experiences and interests. A fifth section considers movement-related behaviours. The collection of data involved Checklists being completed by teachers in 34 randomly selected schools for 420 3 to 5 year old children. Analysis reveals that the Early Years Movement Skills Checklist identifies movement difficulties in this age group and significant differences are found between children who display movement difficulties and those who do not. A reliability study involving measures for interrater and test-retest reliability was completed. The overall interrater reliability correlation coefficient for the Checklist was 0.96 and the overall test-retest reliability correlation coefficient for the Checklist was 0.94; both highly significant. A validity study focusing on the predictive validity compared data collected from the Checklist with data from a normative motor skills test from the Movement Assessment Battery for Children (Henderson & Sugden, 1992). A significant correlation coefficient value of 0.76 was returned for the whole of the selected sample. The relationship between movement skill difficulties and movement-related behaviours was investigated. Children with movement difficulties were found to display a higher incidence of social and affective disorders than children without movement difficulties. This finding is in line with current views on movement difficulties and associated or concomitant difficulties. The Early Years Movement Skills Checklist was found to be an efficient, speedy and accurate assessment instrument to aid in the identification of young children with movement difficulties.