Monitoring physical fitness to enhance the development of physical literacy in children and adolescents: FitBack4Literacy

29/09/2023

ISCA and FitBack4Literacy partners


The FitBack4Literacy project is bringing together 10 partnering institutions across Europe, alongside several associated international organisations, to expand the established FitBack network (www.fitbackeurope.eu; former Erasmus+ project) across the research, education and sport sectors.

The aim of FitBack4Literacy is to design and test an open, transnational fitness monitoring online tool to deliver pertinent feedback to educators, children, youth, and parents as a means of directly enhancing physical literacy development of children and adolescents. 

FitBack4Literacy will focus its activities at the local level (e.g., schools, sport clubs) to accelerate physical literacy development via: 

1) involving teachers and coaches in a co-design process to upgrade the existing FitBack system by constructing a digital toolkit for PE teachers on how to use fitness monitoring to develop physical literacy of adolescents
2) leveraging the support of several international sport and physical education associations in engaging stakeholders in an attempt to reduce stigma, and support a positive experience around physical fitness testing
3) evaluating the upgraded FitBack reporting system, including a novel, multi-lingual toolkit, which will be tested across eight European-wide sites to determine its feasibility and effectiveness in monitoring fitness and developing physical literacy. 

FitBack4Literacy targets multiple UN Sustainable Development goals in its endeavour to disseminate fitness expertise across multiple sectors, supporting fostering long-term, positive health outcomes in youth.

The consortium partners are University of Ljubljana (coordinator), University of Granada, University of Zagreb, University of Bozen, University of Jyväskylä, University of Tartu, University of Belgrade, University of Lisbon, European Physical Education Association, and International Sport and Culture Association.

European Commission Erasmus+ Programme: Sport - ID 101089829 
Project period: 1 January 2023 – 31 December 2025 funded for 400,000 EUR

Disclaimer: Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neiither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.

Photo: Jeffrey F. Lin/Unsplash