What is Physical Literacy?
Learn how being active gives us the opportunity to practice fundamental movement skills.
No matter what age, everyone can benefit from a lifelong journey of physical literacy through an active lifestyle. Strengthening or learning skills in physical literacy can be broken down into four elements:
- Motivation and Confidence
- Physical Competence
- Knowledge and Understanding
- Engagement in Physical Activities for Life
These four elements provide the foundation to be physically active for life.
Confidence is one of the leading factors for children, youth and adult sport withdrawal. Starting with motivation and confidence can lead to more enjoyment and ultimately more participation in an active lifestyle.
"Physical literacy is the motivation, confidence, physical competence, knowledge, and understanding to value and take responsibility for engagement in physical activities for life." - The International Physical Literacy Association
Physical competence is all about practice, not perfection. Doing a sport well, or successfully is not the goal. Moving your body in a variety of ways consistently is the goal. Through movement we get the opportunity to practice fundamental movement skills, which are important to go onto participating and enjoying sports. Examples of fundamental movement skills include:
- Body control: agility, balance, coordination, speed and rhythm
- Locomotor: running, jumping, swimming, wheeling, skating and more
- Object control: sending, receiving, dribbling, striking, kicking and more
Knowledge and understanding sometimes come with age; when we have the cognitive understanding that an active lifestyle has mental and physical benefits, our motivation gets reaffirmed.
And finally, Engagement in physical activities for life is a behavioural pattern that can take time, but when we start at an early age, it’s simply just part of life.
Maintaining good physical literacy can keep us safe and healthy both mentally and physically. Prioritizing our health has never been more important. The City of Surrey is proud to offer programming for all ages and all interests; find something today and keep building on the building blocks of a healthy lifestyle.