Effects of Kindergarten, Family Environment, and Physical Activity on Children’s Physical Fitness

Authors: Wenyan Huang, Jiong Luo and Yanmei Chen

To explore the relationship between kindergarten environmental factors, children's physical activity, and physical fitness, this study uses the stratified random sampling method to obtain 4,600 children in relevant kindergartens. The questionnaire survey and children's physical fitness test were completed with the help of parents and kindergarten staff. The exploratory (EFA) and confirmatory (CFA) factor analysis is used to process the obtained database and set the significance level of all indicators _ = 0.05. The results show that kindergarten environmental factors significantly affect children's physical activity and healthy physical fitness. Children with large play areas in these kindergartens, more sports equipment items, who participate in more than three games per week, of no <40 min of each class, with an appropriate number of classes, and excellent teachers' teaching ability have better physical fitness. Family environmental factors significantly affect children's physical activity and fitness. Children with more family sports equipment items, more peers living nearby, safer playing places, more hands and feet, and parents who are good at sports have better performance in health fitness. Children's physical activity not only directly affects their performance of physical fitness, but also plays a dual intermediary role between kindergarten environment and physical fitness, family environment, and healthy physical fitness.

Frontiers in Public Health

2022