Coordination Development Disorder: unknown by parents and teachers

Abstract

The study aimed to analyze learning difficulties from the perspective of motor skills disorders considering the perception of parents and teachers about the motor, emotional, academic and daily activities of children with probable Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD). 42 parents, 32 teachers and 42 preschoolers participated. As instruments, the Movement Assessment Battery for Children (MABC-2) and questionnaires for parents and teachers about child’s development were used. Data were analyzed using Shapiro Wilk, Wilkoxon, Mann-Whitney “U” test and Binary Logistic Regression. The results showed that teachers better understand the difficulties in motor skills of children with persistent DCD (pDCD) or variation on DCD (vDCD) and better understand the emotional, academic difficulties and the difficulties related to daily activities. In conclusion, teachers show a better perception of the difficulties presented by children with pDCD and the variation in the diagnosis of DCD interferes in the perception of the children’s motor difficulties.