Kids’ basic movement skills are on decline

CAN’T throw, can’t catch and can’t jump. Are we raising a generation of “butter fingers”?

Alarming new research has revealed that Australian children are losing fundamental movement skills that used to be taken for granted — catching and throwing balls, kicking, hopping, skipping and running.

Today’s primary school children can’t jump as far as children were able to in 1985 — falling short by an average of 16.4cm — a major study has found.

And a new national report card into children’s skills — which scores Aussie kids a “Dplus” for movement — reveals Year 6 boys and girls boys have extremely low levels of “mastery” in kicking, throwing overarm, catching and leaping.

A kindergarten-age girl today would probably not even know how to play hopscotch, the experts said.

The study, The Great Leap Backwards, Changes in the Jumping Performance of Australian Children Aged 11-12 years Between 1985 and 2015, looked at how far 4000 children aged 11 and 12 could jump.

They were asked to leap as far as they could while standing, with the best of three attempts recorded. When researchers checked the results against the same test conducted three decades ago they were amazed at the decline.

Thirty years ago Year 6 boys could leap 151.5cm, but this had fallen to 133.5cm in the latest study. For girls the fall was from 141.9cm to 127cm.

One of authors, Professor Grant Tomkinson from the University of North Dakota, said the researchers even factored in that today’s children were heavier than previous generations because they had more body fat. The decline still averaged 11.1cm.

“When we balance everything out and take a kid from 2015 and their ‘like’ peer from 1985 — a kid of the same age, sex and body size — today’s kids don’t have as much muscular strength,” he said.

Extra weight is not the only reason for the decline. Others included too much screen time, restrictions on children freely running around, and smaller or no backyards.