Amirtash Ali Mohammad, Mozaffari Seyed Amir Ahmad and Kamelia Abdi
Physical activity as a main factor in socialization has been teachers’ concept in different cultures. The purpose of this research was to determine the effect of rope skipping on social skills (SS) and academic performance (AP) on students of grade 4 in elementary schools. Participants were 84 students, randomly sampled among graded 4 students, in 4 educational areas, Shiraz, Iran. According to three control factors schools were randomly selected. Data collection occurred after and before performing rope skipping. The rope skipping was exercised for 45 minutes per week, in 12 weeks. Teachers completed the teachers’ rating of social skills questionnaire (TRSSQ) about students. Academic performance was obtained from school lessons. The TRSSQ was based on subscales of non social competence (NSC), social skill (SS) and peer relation (PR). It was consists of 56 items designed to measure NSC with 30 items, SS with 30 items, and PR with 15 items. Each of the TRSSQ items was on a Likert scale. The AP was defined as a class point average and it was descriptive. The hypotheses were if there were any significant effects on AP and SS by rope skipping performance among elementary students. Paired sample t-tests were conducted for these hypotheses. The statistical analysis showed there were significant differences after and before rope skipping in AP (p≤ 0.05). So performing rope skipping had significant effects on AP. Also the analysis presented there were significant differences after and before rope skipping in SS (p≤ 0.05). Although the hypotheses were approved, results should carefully interpret about correlations.
