Gross motor skills are the movements we make with large muscles, like those in our legs, arms, and torso. "Gross", in this case, means "large", and "motor" means "movement". Gross motor skills require the co-ordination and function of skeletal muscles, bones and nerves and are vital for developing balance, coordination, spatial awareness and reaction time.

Gross motor skills are important to enable children to perform everyday functions, such as walking and running, playground skills (like, climbing) and sporting skills (for example, catching, throwing and hitting a ball with a bat).

They are also crucial for everyday selfcare skills like dressing (standing on one leg to put on pants without falling over) and climbing into and out of a car or a bed, or on and off a potty or toilet.

Gross motor skills also have an influence on other everyday functions. For example, your child's ability to maintain appropriate posture when sitting at a desk (upper body support) will affect their ability to master fine motor skills like writing, drawing and cutting.

Gross motor skills impact on a child's endurance to cope with a full day of school (sitting upright at a desk, moving between classrooms, carrying a school bag). They also impact the ability of a child to navigate their environment (like, walking around classroom furniture, up a sloped hill or getting on and off a moving escalator).

At mainly music and mainly play, children are engaging in lots of gross motor skill activities – all the better for their bodies!