Rowing Performance Following a Single Teaching Session in School Children

Purpose: The teaching of sport activities during childhood is fundamental to improve their fitness levels, but also to promote inclusion, sense of responsibility and self-discipline. In many countries physical activity based educational programs include rowing among the disciplines that schools promote and support. In Italy, rowing is not included in the common school activities; thus, we carried out a pilot project in a secondary school in Sicily to evaluate the efficacy of teaching and learning of the basic concepts of rowing technique in school pre-adolescents exposed to rowing for the first time. Methods: After a 2-hour teaching session, a short survey was administered, and the 20 seconds maximum speed test was performed by 62 schoolchildren (12-14 years of age) of both sexes. Results: Despite some difference in anthropometric characteristics, and in the retention of the information provided before the questionnaire, no significant difference between male and female students was observed in the 20 second all-out test. Conclusions, and Applications in Sport: Rowing could be easily performed by all school kids and should be included in the physical activities performed at school to improve not only their physical skills but also their wellbeing.