Motor Games Effects on Learning to Spell Numbers in 5- to 6-Year-Old Pupils

摘要

The writing skills, which are crucial for learning in school, develop as the child gets older. They can be enhanced through various approaches. In this study, we aimed to examine the effects of motor games, which is a didactic approach, on learning how to spell Arabic numbers. Fifty-one pupils aged between 5 and 6 years old (age = 6.17 ± 0.33 years) took part in this study. They were divided into 3 different learning groups: 1 ) a control group that followed a classical learning (CG: n = 17) using visual and auditory modalities ; 2 ) a second group that followed a multisensory learning modality (MSG: n = 17) ; ?and 3 ) a third group that followed a motor learning modality (MLG: n = 17). The digits spelling performances (from 0 to 9 in random orders) were assessed before and after 10 learning sessions. The retained parameters from the spelling test were the direction of the digits, the number of correct digits out of 10, and the number of non-mirrored digits out of 8. The results showed that the spelling test performance improved for all groups after the three learning modalities. However, the MLG showed the highest gains in plotting numbers performance (7.06 ± 1.25) compared to the CG (0.65 ± 2.32) and MSG (2.41 ± 2.15) (P < 0.05). In addition, the other performance?parameters displayed similar gains. These results suggest that the motor learning method is the most effective for improving numbers spelling, particularly for the digits spelling direction, compared to other learning methods.