Abstract:

An important indicator of mental development at pre-school age is intentional behaviour. At this age, physical activity is known to promote cognitive abilities and development of intentional behaviour. The number of children with socially vulnerable background is increasing. Therefore it was necessary to investigate opportunities for organizing karate-do classes for 6-year old cognitively passive children from low-income families to develop their cognitive abilities.

The following research question was formulated: Do specially designed karate-do classes for cognitively passive 6-year old children from low-income families stimulate development of cognitive abilities?

The research aim was to study the opportunities for organizing karate-do classes for cognitively passive 6-year old children from low-income families to promote development of their cognitive abilities.

The Express Cognitive Ability Test (ECAT) was applied.
Statistically significant correlations were found between karate-do classes and the development of cognitive abilities of cognitively passive 6-year old pre-schoolers from low-income families. Specially organized karate-do classes develop vocabulary, understanding of qualitative and quantitative changes of things, logical thinking and mathematical skills of cognitively passive 6-year old children from low-income families.

During karate-do classes, significant differences were found in the results on four ECAT subtests of cognitively passive pre-schoolers from families with low income. Karate-do classes with cognitively passive pre-schoolers from low-income families can maintain a relatively high level of their physical activity, whereas cognitive development promotes the development of intentional behaviour.

Keywords:

Cognitively passive, karate-do classes, low-income families, 6-year old children.