La especialización deportiva temprana. Aproximación al pensamiento de futuros maestros de educación física

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to analyse the main reasons that contribute to the abandonment of sports practice. So, we have accomplished a descriptive study, for which we have used a questionnaire, answered by the students of the Master Degree in Primary Education from the Faculty of Teacher Training of the University of Santiago de Compostela. The question list, answered in an anonymous and disinterested way, focuses on aspects related to the current sports practice and at school of all these students. Among the more relevant conclussions, we can highlight the damaging effect of the early sporting specialization, since it is about a model that recreates aspects closer to the elite sport than to the educational one. Also, this is a model that omits the psycho-evolutionary development of the child, and obviously, this brings many risks from a physic and phsychological point of view. Finally, we can also add that there is an alarming abandonment of sport practice in the period corresponding to Compulsory Secondary Education and High School period. Such abandonment is highly influenced by the desmotivation caused by a school sport model that excludes the ludic nature of sporting practice from very early ages.