Abstract
Slovenia is a pioneer in the systematic monitoring of physical fitness in children and adolescents. In 1969, a national system for monitoring physical and somatic development, called the Sports Educational Chart, was developed and later revised in 1987. Since 1987, all Slovenian primary and secondary schools complete three anthropometric and eight physical fitness measures to assess child development on the population level. The results are processed by the Faculty of Sport, University of Ljubljana, Laboratory of Physical and Motor Development. The Laboratory provides feedback to every schoolchild, class and school. In recent years, advanced IT support was upgraded and renamed as the SLOfit system. Registered users of SLOfit, consist of PE teachers, parents, children, and physicians, who are able to use the on-line application My SLOfit. Through My SLOfit, individuals can follow their development, assess health risks or get advice. The web platform facilitates cooperation between the educational and health system enabling a holistic approach to developmental difficulties. The My SLOfit application works as a powerful communication tool with other platforms, including a website (www.slofit.org), and Facebook. This article presents the basic features of the SLOfit surveillance system and highlights its development as a support tool for efficient, holistic data use.
Highlights
Physical activity takes place in a variety of contexts, most commonly in children during play, leisure sports training, physical education at school, active transport to school, and via organized sporting activities
The amount and intensity of physical activity results in the improvement of physical fitness which is linked to reduced health risks and increased quality of life
Individuals with sufficient level of physical fitness can effectively carry out their daily activities without premature fatigue, and with sufficient energy
Summary
Physical activity takes place in a variety of contexts, most commonly in children during play, leisure sports training, physical education at school, active transport to school, and via organized sporting activities. Changes in an individual’s behaviour as a response to wearing the device or various environmental factors such as weather conditions can independently affect and distort the usual behaviour we are attempting to assess Despite these well-documented shortcomings, accelerometer-based measuring devices (i.e. objectively measured physical activity monitors) are much more reliable in assessing physical activity and energy use than subjective information obtained from activity questionnaires alone (Adamo, Prince, Tricco, Connor-Gorber, & Tremblay, 2009). Its first national system for surveillance of somatic and motor development in Slovenia, called the Physical Education Chart, was developed already in 1969 This system proved to be too ambitious for its time and was never implemented on the population level due to demanding test battery and analytical difficulties in the period when computer support was at its beginnings. The results are sent to the Faculty of Sport, University of Ljubljana, Laboratory for Physical and Motor Development, where all the data is centrally analysed and within few days the feedback on the level of individual, class and school is sent back to schools
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