Differences in the level of motor skills of students who additionally train basketball for recreational purposes

The organization of sports and recreational exercise at school aims to encourage the general and proper development of the body, gain the widest possible motor experience, create useful habits that will remain throughout life and serve the function of developing and preserving health, as well as satisfying children's needs for movement and play. The research in this paper was conducted with the aim of showing the effects of recreational basketball practice within an additional section at school on eighth grade students, compared to students who were not included in it. For the purposes of the paper, three motor tests (explosive power) were used: long jump from a standing position, high jump (Sargent test), and medicine ball throw from a standing position. The results of the research showed that the trend of motor skills development with regard to trained (recreational) and untrained students, occurs in accordance with the laws of motor skills development. The long jump test shows that there is also a statistically significant difference in the results (at the 0.95 level) between the two groups of respondents, so it can be concluded that the activity in the basketball section has an impact on the achievement in this test. Regarding the results of the high jump test, which is 9.478, with a probability of error, rejecting the null hypothesis, if it is correct, which is 0.004. the results obtained indicate that the activity in the section had an impact. When it comes to the medicine ball throw test, the F statistic value of 24.61 is observed, which points to the same conclusion. The obtained data clearly show us that the additional activity of the basketball section members is undoubtedly reflected positive in the results of the abilities measured by the high jump, long jump and medicine ball throw tests.