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A real world feasibility trial of the PLAYshop: an intervention to facilitate parent engagement in developing their child’s physical literacy


 Background

Development of physical literacy, defined as “the motivation, confidence, physical competence, knowledge and understanding to value and take responsibility for engagement in physical activities for life”, can support children’s physically active behaviors and consequent health benefits. Little research exploring interventions to improve children's physical literacy exist, although substantive evidence shows parents play a key role in children's physically active behaviors and development of fundamental movement skills. The purpose of this study is to explore a novel, physical literacy intervention designed to assist parents to engage with their child in purposeful play; play that facilitates the development of physical literacy.
Methods

The PLAYshop was a 75-minute workshop to build parents' self-efficacy to support their child’s physical literacy through interactive activities and educational messages as well as educational resources focused on core physical literacy concepts. We collected quantitative pre- and post-workshop surveys of parents’ satisfaction, knowledge, confidence and intention to adopt practices as well as qualitative follow-up implementation focused interviews from both parents and facilitators. We used paired t-tests to examine changes in parents' self-reported physical literacy knowledge and confidence and thematic analysis of interviews to explore workshop feasibility.
Results

Six workshops were delivered to 33 parents of young children (3–8 years of age). 23 parents completed both pre- and post-workshop surveys. Follow-up interviews were completed with 11 parents and four workshop facilitators. Parents’ self-reported knowledge and confidence to support their child’s physical literacy development significantly increased after PLAYshop participation. Further, the majority of parents were satisfied with the workshop and motivated to apply workshop learnings at-home with their child. Workshop facilitators identified seven workshop strengths (e.g., workshop champions and skilled facilitators) and four challenges (e.g., recruitment and unfavorable spaces).
Conclusions

The PLAYshop was perceived positively by parents and facilitators and appeared to improve parent self-efficacy and intention to promote physical literacy with their child. Recruitment and attendance were key implementation challenges. The findings from this real world trial address an important evidence gap, highlighting areas for adaptations to improve the intervention and recruitment and suggesting that the PLAYshop is ready for efficacy testing in a more rigorous randomized controlled trial.