Efficacy of a 7-week dance (RCT) PE curriculum with different teaching pedagogies and levels of cognitive challenge to improve working memory capacity and motor competence in 8–10 years old children

Abstract Objectives This study examined how learning a dance choreography with different teaching pedagogies and different cognitive challenge influenced the development of working memory capacity and motor competence in primary school children. Design Randomised-controlled trial. Methods Eighty primary school children (8.8 ± 0.7 years old; 61% females) were recruited and randomly assigned to two experimental groups – a high-cognitive and a low-cognitive group – and a control group. The two experimental groups practiced dance for 7 weeks, twice a week, learning a choreography, while the control group participated in the school standard PE curriculum. In the high-cognitive group, the dance teachers limited visual demonstrations and encouraged children to memorise and recall movement sequences to increase the cognitive challenge. Results While the pre-to post-test improvements did not statistically differ between experimental groups, the analysis showed that the high-cognitive group statistically improved their working memory capacity (p  Conclusions The results of this study provide initial support that dance practice coupled with a high cognitive challenge could improve working memory capacity and motor competence in children; however, the difference between groups was not statistically significant, and future research is necessary to examine the generalization of this finding.