Preschool FUNdamentals at home: Easy and fun activities to practice basic movement skills at home

Fundamental movement skills (FMS) are basic movement skills such as running, jumping, throwing and catching. These skills develop during the preschool years and support healthy growth and development in children. They are important for your child’s physical development and also for their social and cognitive development. 

Professor John Cairney is the Head of School at Human Movement and Nutrition Science at UQ. He recently dropped into Health and Wellbeing Queensland to share some tips for keeping kids active at home. 

Cairney says that FMS are particularly important for children under 6 or 7 and to develop these you need to get kids comfortable doing lots of different activities. 

“The important thing is that they feel competent and confident in their abilities to move and one way we can do that is encouraging kids to lead – they should be taking the action and the lead role in structuring the activities and the games that they play,” he says. 

“A lot of activities that we focus on are things that involve upper and lower body coordination, moving with hands, moving with hands and feet at the same time and balanced-based activities. 

“All of these things are important for a child’s general development.”

Watch the video below and check out these activities that you can play at home with your child to promote physical, social and cognitive development. 

You’ll see you don’t need much spare or equipment, the key to all of these games is to be creative and have fun!