PDFE #6

General Motor Ability Test

The purpose of this lab was to demonstrate that a general motor ability does not exist by comparing the performance of different people on both static and dynamic balancing tasks. If people had a general motor ability, it would be expected that they would perform similarly on all of the tasks, but the results in this lab did not support this idea. In this lab we conducted a general motor ability test by ranking the performance of the six participants in each group, from best to worst for each balance task. In my group the participants were me, Caysie, Emma, Jenny, Kara, and Melissa. Each participant was tested individually and when not being tested the participant would by a timer and recorder for someone else. We collected three trials of data for each participant for each task. Once tested the participants were ranked by comparing best scores. The balancing tasks that were performed are the following:

Stork Stand: Stand on your preferred foot while hooking the instep of your other foot behind the knee of your support leg (your bent knee points forward). Place your hands on your hips and rise to the ball of your foot. Your score is the amount of time you can hold the position with good form.

Diver’s Stand: Stand with your feet together and your arms extended in front of you (90 degree shoulder flexion). Close your eyes and rise to the balls of your feet. Your score is the amount of time you can hold the position with good form.

Heel Stand: Get into a ready position (defense stance) with your feet about shoulder- width apart. Crouch slightly so that your hands rest on your knees. Keep your head up and rock back onto your heels so that your toes do not touch the ground. Your score is the amount of time you can hold the position with good form.

Sideward Leap- Balance on left foot on left tape mark, leap sideways to the other mark one meter away and land with right foot, balance for a two count then bend down to touch the outside of your right ankle with your right index finger.  Stand up again and after another two count leap back to your left foot, bend down and touch left ankle with left index finger.  Continue and your score is the number of times you touch an ankle in thirty seconds without falling.  If you fall, move back to the starting position and resume counting from there.

Bass Stepping-Stone- Using tape make five lines along the floor, like rungs of a ladder, evenly spaced about 3 meters long. (.75 meter spacing) Balance on the ball of one foot on the first spot, leap forward to the next spot landing on the ball of the opposite foot.  Hold position for two counts and then continue to the next mark.  When you get to the end, stay on one foot and turn around slowly by hopping and return in the other direction. Your score is the number of lines you cross in 30 seconds.

Book-Balancing Walk- Place a strip of masking tape 3 meters long on the floor.  Beginning at one end of the tape, walk heel to toe while balancing a book on your head.  Your score is the amount of time it takes you to walk the full length, turn around and come back without dropping the book or stepping off the tape.  If you drop the book, place it back on your head and continue from the point at which it dropped.

Participant	Stork	Diver	Heel	Side	Bass	Book
Melissa	4	6	2	1	1	5
Jenny	2	5	4	6	4	4
Emma	6	4	6	1	6	3
Kara	1	2	1	1	1	2
Caysie	3	1	3	1	1	1
Caitlin	5	3	5	1	4	6

This lab proved that general motor ability does not exist because no one is the best at all of the balance tasks. The results may have also been skewed due to milliseconds therefore causing someone to be ranked number 2 instead of number 1. In the stork task everyone’s time was fairly different from one another, but with all of the other tasks we all had very close scores. We did find a correlation in skills when concerning the overall ranking of skills.