Fundamental movement skills are the most basic movements we can make and they can be built up into complex actions. It’s pretty much the same idea as language, where each individual sound needs to be mastered to correctly form words. Fundamental movement skills for the basis of our physical literacy and that should make it clear how important they are. Depending on who you ask, fundamental movement skills can be broken down in any number of ways. However, the easiest way of looking at them is by separating the skills into three categories: locomotion, stabilisation and manipulation.
• Locomotion
Basically, anything to do with movement. If you can use a skill to move your body from one place to another, then you’re talking about a locomotion skill. These include walking, running, hopping, swimming, skipping, jogging, jumping and any other form of moving you can think of.
• Stabilisation
These are skills that show your depth of control over your body, usually by stopping movements or making finely controlled ones. Stabilisation skills include actions such as balancing, stretching, twisting, landing, bending, pivoting, hanging and other ways you can control your motion.
• Manipulation
Finally, manipulation skills are all linked to moving other things that aren’t directly attached to you. Moving things by throwing, catching, pushing, pulling, bouncing, dribbling, trapping and just about anything else you can do to an object (think of things you can do to a ball for example). Manipulation is also the most complex set of tasks and as such it is generally split into three sub-categories: sending, receiving and travelling (again, think of the ball).
