A forward roll is a fundamental acrobatic element in gymnastics that requires good spatial orientation and body coordination from the practitioner, and significant knowledge, experience, and physical readiness from the instructor or teacher, as assistance is often needed. To teach a forward roll, alongside general knowledge of motor development and abilities and teaching methods, a thorough understanding of gymnastics is essential. In this thesis, we first present natural forms of movement, focusing on rolling, tumbling, swaying, and the forward roll. We will introduce various didactic approaches and aids, an assessment tool for evaluating knowledge, and analyze existing research on teaching gymnastics.
Specific differences in child and student development dictate different learning and teaching approaches among educators and teachers. In our thesis, we studied the extent to which these approaches differ between educators and teachers, their knowledge of didactic methods for teaching forward rolls, whether there are differences in the most commonly used motor teaching methods, and the use of didactic aids in teaching forward rolls. We also examined the extent to which opinions differ on the usefulness of a developed assessment scale for monitoring children's motor development.
Our sample included 100 educators and 100 teachers from the first three grades of primary schools in Central Slovenia. All participants completed the same closed-type questionnaire, which included demographic questions and questions related to the professional workers' knowledge of teaching forward rolls, their knowledge and use of motor teaching methods for forward rolls, the use of didactic aids, recording and assessing children's motor development, and the usefulness of the assessment scale in teaching.
We analyzed the collected data and conducted a comparative analysis, which we presented with graphs and interpreted. We expected the thesis to highlight weaknesses in the knowledge of teaching forward rolls among both educators and teachers. Our analysis revealed that teachers feel more competent in teaching forward rolls compared to educators. Consequently, they also teach forward rolls more frequently – 21% of surveyed educators do not teach forward rolls, mainly citing a lack of didactic knowledge and fear of injuries. This issue is associated with lower levels of education – respondents who do not feel competent to teach forward rolls and do not know any motor teaching methods have a lower level of education. These findings can be linked to the fact that the Curriculum for Kindergartens (1999) contains only recommendations and allows greater autonomy, whereas the Sports Education Curriculum for Primary Schools (Kovač et al., 2011) sets minimum knowledge standards that a child must achieve to progress to the next level of the educational program.
The research showed that the analytical method is the most commonly used method for teaching forward rolls among teachers – they teach forward rolls step by step, explaining and demonstrating each part. Among educators, the synthetic method is the most commonly used, where they teach forward rolls by gradually building them into a whole without demonstration. Both educators and teachers use preparatory exercises when teaching forward rolls.
The most commonly used preparatory exercise among both groups is rocking on a rounded back, with teachers adding rocking on a rounded back with standing up into a squat. Both groups most frequently use a soft mat on the floor for teaching, followed by a polyvalent mat and a slight incline from a springboard.
The data showed that both educators and teachers mostly use descriptive recording of motor development. When teaching forward rolls, both groups assess the forward roll based on the correctness of the execution.
We found that the developed assessment scale is well-designed and would help respondents in monitoring children's motor development, and it would mainly familiarize educators with the didactics of teaching forward rolls.
With this thesis, we aim to raise awareness among professional workers about the importance of correctly teaching forward rolls, provide a realistic picture of the knowledge of individual professional workers, and through theoretical foundations, equip professional workers in their weak areas.
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