Effect of 12-week basic gymnastic training on physical fitness in 6 to 7 year-old boys

Gymnastics requires a great range of locomotive, stability and body control movements which are highly important for the development of children. In this study, it was aimed the effect of 12-week basic gymnastic training on physical fitness in 6 to 7 year-old boys. Pre-test and post-test with controlled group were used to test the sub-problems of the study and experimental group was determined by randomly. 30 boys in 6-7 year-old participated to the study as an experimental group, which has just begun to be gymnastic in Malatya Youth Services and Sports Provincial Directorate. The researcher applied a 30-minute warm-up program based on gymnastic basic movements as well as gymnastics training for 12 weeks, 3 days in a week. In the study; we investigated that significant differences between some physical parameters (age, sports age, Body Mass Index (BMI), height and weight), performance characteristics and recorded values of groups The data are evaluated by using the SPSS 17.0 (Statistical Package for the Social Science) statistical program. Paired Sample t Test and Independent Samples t Test were used to determine the relationship between groups. In addition, arithmetic mean, significance and percentage were used and significance level was determined as 0.05. As a result, there has been a significant differences between pre and post measurements in the experimental group. It has been a factor affecting especially in the gymnastics that the athlete's performance positively in the experimental group, the warm-up phase in each training session, together with the number of training duration and the number of movements. Key Words: Child, Physical Fitness, Gymnastics, Warm-up