Effects of a Sport Stacking Intervention on Second-Grade Students

Purpose: Previous research revealed some positive influence of sport stacking on psychomotor performance for school children. The present study extended the research on classroom performance by examining the effects of sport stacking exercise intervention not only on hand-eye coordination, reaction time, but also handwriting skills. Methods: Eighty-three 2nd grade students were randomly assigned into either the control or experimental group. While the experimental group participated in a 15-min session of sport stacking activities every day for 14 weeks, the control group was supervised in other physical activities during the same period of time. The pre- and post-tests included dexterity, reaction time and handwriting. Analysis/Results: A 2 (groups) X 2 (tests) two-way ANOVA with repeated measures on the second factor was used on all dependent measures to access the efficacy of sport stacking exercise intervention. While all the participants improved their performances in the post-test, results revealed a tendency, F(1, 81) = 3.09, p = .08, that the experimental group had a greater improvement in handwriting speed than the control in the post-test, while keeping the correct letter formation equally well between the two groups. Moreover, a consistent pattern was found for the dexterity test and 2-choice reaction time, but no statistical significance was reached. Conclusions: The findings suggest that sport stacking activities might have a positive influence on fine motor skill development for school children. Further research is needed before a strong conclusion can be made.